Tiny Baby Bird Found

Well when I first found the baby bird in the nest on the floor (btw there was 1 egg next to the nest on the floor too but it was dry inside and cracked but not broken open) I knew that its best chance of survival was for its parent to take care of it. So I got my ladder and tried to find a good spot to place the nest back on the tree, I even went as far as tying the nest to a fork in a branch using a soft long branch from the tree itself. It held up good and did not compromise the nest.

I left the nest on the tree for about 4 hours but no birds came to the nest at all (I watched from inside my house, out of sight).. and my tree gets a lot of action from different types of birds all day long (humming birds, those small black crow birds, miniature red pigeons (like the one I posted on a long time ago), small birds that are very tiny as adults and fly fast like bullets the locals call them "Reinitas" or "princess'" in English and another big bird like a Robin look alike. (I'm in Puerto Rico)

When I saw that no birds came to attend the baby I thought to myself I had to do something about it.. I felt like it was going to starve to death and now that I've been taking care of this bird I notice that he/she asks for food approximately every 2 hours and it eats a lot. So I assume it is doing well.

I will need to find out about the diet though because I do think it probably would eat insects from its mother and in adult hood. So far he/she likes the stuff I'm giving it and its poop seems normal enough like my Love Birds'.

I'll make another video in a week hopefully.

aww thank you for saving the baby, sounds like you did everything right
here's the old fons diet i will try to find the updated one and get back to you later, it has changed slightly.
if your using parrot handfeeding formula for now, you can also soak a little dry kitten food in water and offer her pieces of that, and you can scramble up and egg and offer her pieces of that also,a few blueberries would also be good. i'm sure she's a insect eater also, not sure what she is, i'm not sure what's native to you.
looks like your doin a great job, keep her warm with a heating pad, she probobly should be fed every 15-30 minutes sun up to sun down, if you miss some feedings you can make them up into the evening. you might also want to line a little bowl with tissue so she feels cozy an safe like she would in her nest.
120 g (1 cup) Eukanuba® Chicken & Rice Kitten Formula, presoaked in about
1.25 cup water
• 71 g (1 jar) Beech-Nut Stage 1 Chicken & Chicken Broth® Baby Food
• 12 g (2 Tb.) dried egg white
• 5 g (1 tsp.) active-culture plain yogurt or liquid acidophilus
• 2 g (1/2 tsp.) Avi-Era® multiple vitamins or custom vitamin mix described
below
• 3 g pure calcium carbonate
Blend in food processor until smooth. Water amounts may be varied to achieve
desired consistency for feeding. Soaking time is reduced if kitten kibble is pulverized
in food processor prior to adding water. See notes below for important information
about ingredients.
Dry Weight Composition: 46% protein, 22% fat, 23% carbohydrate
Calciumhosphorus ratio: 2:1 Energy: 1.3 kc/cc
Supplementing with live insects is recommended.
FoNS© 2002 Diane Winn, Avian Haven
Ingredient

Bless you for taking in this baby. Being in Puerto Rico I'm not sure what species this is - it kinda looks like a grackle that we have here in the states.

Its beak is that of an insect eater and as such, needs to be fed a diet consistent with that. What we usually do is buy Gerber #2 baby food, chicken or beef and feed it just like you are doing with the mixture you made up. Also, soak a good quality brand of dog/cat dry food until soft but not soggy. We use Science Diet. Break the pellets in half or even quarters and feed a small amount.

You will need to be very careful that it doesn't develop Metabolic Bone Disease which can cripple it. To help prevent this, feed it some small pieces of grapes or blueberries at every meal. You can also shave a cuttlebone into its food to help add calcium or even about a quarter of regular calcium tablets or Tums. I can't stress enough how serious this disease is for growing babies.

I enjoyed your video. I think you have the best shot I have seen of how a songbird's crop looks. It is that white bulge at the side of its neck. (A pigeon's crop is on its chest.) One caution though. Watch this closely and don't fill it quite as full as you did in this video. They will continue to cry for food even when they're full.

Xenku,

You may know about this already, but baby pigeons can get "splay leg" or splayed leg if they do not have something beneath them which keeps their legs from slipping out sideways from underneath them. Their legs grow improperly and stick out sideways or forwards or backwards, and they cannot use this leg . Maybe put a few twigs beneath him, like he ad in his nest. Or use the old nest. I am not an expert in this kind of bird, but you might keep an eye open for this situation developing.

One pigeon vet here in Germany said soft rubber tubing (about 1/4 inch in diameter), such as is used for aquariums, is good for attaching to feeding syringes. The feeding seems to be going well, however.

Make sure he stays warm and out of drafts. He needs to save his energy for growing, rather than for staying warm, even in Puerto Rico, I imagine.

Great job, in my opinion!

He is so tiny and cute!

Larry

He looks like Picture number 3 , except he can stand up on both his legs and grab my finger and stand on it too. Wow, picture number 3 is almost identical. He has a little more feathers though, I guess you could say he is somewhere between picture #3 and #4.

Maybe he is a different type of Mocking Bird not a Northern.

I'm also starting to worry about what to do with him in the future.

1. When is he going to be ready to be released?

2. Will he survive on his own since he was raised by me?

3. Will he know what to do to take care of himself?

My greatest worry is that I went through all the effort to raise him and keep him alive and then when released he dies because he cannot take care of himself. What should I do?

i would say you have about a month to go at least before he is ready for an outdoor cage.
are you in a city or country area?
if you want to have him have the best chance possible you should only let him see you when you need to feed him or clean up.
and make it very bussiness like, no baby talking or snuggles, which i know is really hard to resist doing when they are so flippen cute!
i also make the same noise whenever i feed him, i make little tsk tsk noises so when they are free i can call them when i put food out for them. but a whislte or anything as long as it's the same will work, just remember you want to use something that doesn't make you look like a lunitic to the neiboors!! i've made that mistake before,lol
his chances are good, (much better than if you didn't save him)especially if you support feed him once he's released, he may stick around but he may not, even when they do stick around they eventually come less and less as he figures out where to find food, but he may visit from time to time. i still have blue jays and wrens returning from yrs ago.
if you can't make a very predator proof outdoor enclosure that he can fly in, you will need to let him fly around the house to build up his strength.(make sure windows get covered so he doesn't smash into them) and once he's a bit older he should spend sometime outside getting to know the other birds in the area in a safe cage of course.
keep him away from cats or dogs if you have them, he will not fear them if he sees them at all very important!
i usually keep my babies once old enough in an outdoor enclosure from 2-4 weeks once completly self feeding.
do you have him in a cage yet?? if not, it's time if he is able to perch on your finger.
and it's time to start putting his own food to try and a small dish of water for him.
you can show him the food and hand it to him to eat. were you able to get any mealworms??
you might want to order some online it's much cheaper than getting them at a pet store, you can also soak dry cat food, i use science diet or evo, scrambled egg is good also.
very minumul seed if any, if he's a mocking bird that isn't what he will eat.
you can try suet also, the kind with bugs is the best