I was a Mama for a day

Ok. Hold on to your hat. I have been mothering a BABY BIRD today. OHMYGOD, it is so stinkin' cute! A neighbor found him hop hop hopping around in the middle of our busy street! MAN! So, she scooped him up and that's when I came out the back door to get in my car to go to a plant sale and the grocery store (I know. I lead a very exciting life!)

So, long story short, I ended up with the birdie here because that's just sort of what I do. I don't mind gathering bugs and worms to feed the little fella. And, I'm a biology person by training, so I sort of knew what to do. Sort of...More on that later!

Looky here:



He's got a HUGE beak, right? And I fed him and fed him and fed him. I dug up some worms and got some bugs from the back yard. Ground them up in a little bowl and fed him using chopsticks! And he'd gobble up everything I offered, and then he'd fall sound sound sound asleep. I walked in there once and thought he had died, but he was just zonked out! I put him in a big drawer that had a heating pad on one side, padded with rags and soft tissues. And he LOVED that heating pad. He was all warm and snuggly in there...

SO, then I called a woman who is a licensed person in the state of MA to be a wildlife rehabilitation person. She was VERY chatty, but when she FINALLY got to the point, it turns out this little birdie of mine was simply a fledgling. He is in really good shape and is nearly feathered out. He probably left the nest a week or so early, which is VERY common.

What she told me to do was put said baby into a basket I had - like an Easter basket type thingy. Then, I had to string the basket up into my lilac bush that is right under where the nest is.

They nested in the eave of our house, waaay up there:

I just went out there to check on the situation and I'm happy to report that mama and papa of the baby bird are out there attending to him. They were yelling and squawking at me when I went to see if the basket was still okay up in the tree. It's really windy, so I was worried about it falling down. There they are up in the wires:

So, hopefully they will care for the baby and keep him warm at night and then I can rest easy knowing the baby will go on and be a good, productive citizen of bird society!! : )

That's my exciting story of how I was a baby momma for all of three and a half hours!