O/T Birds

[Bunny_Mad]

Well, i was out walking the other day and i saw a brown lump on the path. As i got nearer i could see it was a bird.

Actually i almost kicked it, accedently as i thought it would fly off!!!

Well i stood watching it and i was just chirping at a tree!!

But on my way back it was gone, i didn't look hurt and i assume it flew off

Just thought i would share this!!!



Anyone else had a close encounter with a wild bird???

 

[m.e.]

Our backyard is simply swarming with wild birds,in part because we feed them, and also because we've never treated ourlawn with any pesticides or chemicals, so there's lots of bugs and suchfor them to munch on. Some of the birds are very nervous around us, butthe littler ones, like the chicadees and goldfinches, are rather bold.When I'm filling up the feeders, they'll sit on the branch and squawkat me, and even jump on the feeder when it's still in my hand. Mybrother actually got a couple chicadees to eat out of his gloved handthis past winter.

We also have a pond next door, and we have seen Canada geese, a mallarddrake and his mate, a cormorant, and a great blue heron all visit.There are acouple red-winged blackbird families that live inthe cattails, and we got to see a little nest this past summer with afew tiny birds in it.

We've had a few really close encounters. A sparrow was caught in athornbush, and my brother freed him. A young, and very inexperiencedhawk, tried to take out a blue jay this past spring. The poor bird wastoo heavy for the hawk to carry, so he was sitting on the ground,clutching the jay, and trying to fight off all the other jays. I awoketo the most awful screeching. I went out there, and got within threefeet of this bird before he took off. The blue jay wasn't even hurt! (Ithink the hawk tried smaller prey after that). And I found a juvenilerobin that was learning to fly, but was a sitting duck just perched onthe ground, so I put him in a box with hay and cotton, and put it up onthe tree stand. He flew off a little later that day.

 

[Carolyn]

Hi BunnyMad,

In the beginning of the Spring this year, a baby starling had falleninto the drop ceiling in my living room. The mother had her nest on thehouse, but somehow this little one found a hole and dropped inside.

I thought it was a mouse and would find it's way out, but the next morning, I discovered it to be a baby starling.

With the help of a friend, we got it out of the drop ceiling area, fedit a nice big worm, got some cat food and diluted it with water andsyringe fed it. It was a Sunday and I called the wildlife rehabber inthe area. At around 3:00 that afternoon, she called me back and saidbring the bird right up. I had kept it in Tucker's travel cage and hada nice nest of hay for it.

The wildlife rehabber was confident that the bird would live, which itdid. It was at the stage of learning to fly and she said quite oftenthe bird will try to fly, but fall to the ground. The mother remainsnearby to protect it and encourage it along. Usually, the birds getback in the air after their initial shock of falling to the ground.

-Carolyn

 

[Bunny_Mad]

Also, when we moved into our last place, we had a birds nest in th loft!!!

 

[StickyBird]

Heh, oh yes, juvenillebirds trying to learn to fly is always interesting! I thinkmy closest encounter was about four years ago (before we got my rabbitor my dog), and recently a few Scrub Jays had had babies and they werenow big enough to be learning to fly. One of them, he must'vebeen curious about the big, black hole at the top of our chimney, fellinto it. Now, normally, he would have just fallen all the wayto the fireplace, or onto the cover to the fireplace; but ours wasdifferent. You see, our thingie (can't remember what it'scalled) that closes off our chimney was stuck halfway shut, and the jaywas sitting on it like a ledge. And he wouldn't come downinto the fireplace, and he wouldn't try to fly back up. Thepoor thing.

My Mom (who goes berserk when she sees astray dog, or animal in trouble) attempted to thrust a large branchdown into our chimney to let the brid climb up. But hedidn't. So we didn't know what to do. A few hourslater (my Mom was about to go insane, and wasn't sure how to handleit), the bird fell down into our fireplace, and when my Dad got homefrom work, the four of us (my Mom, Dad, brother, and me) all grabbedsheets and let the bird loose in our house. It eventuallywent down the hallway, half scared out of its mind, and landed at theend of it, where I snatched it up (using the sheet), and ran outsidewith it. It seemed fine, sooty, but fine.

The funniest part is that we still a bit of the branches in our chimney.

--Melissa and Umbra

 

[dmmcnair]

I have wild bird encounters everyday!!!We have a couple of families of swallows or something that live on ourporches and fireplace. They leave during the winter, but comeback every spring. They drive me crazy cause they are sooooloud in the fireplace, and they dive-bomb my cats! They've alreadyleft, woohoo. When we finally open the fireshoot thingy weare going to have quite a few nests I'm sure falling out!