This week’s patient is a timely reminder that baby bird season is here in full swing. At this time of the year, the Australian Wildlife Hospital will have many baby birds admitted to the hospital as orphans. Many of these patients are merely fledgling birds learning to fly under the watchful eye of the parent bird.

Squirmy is a fledgling Welcome Swallow and the lady who found him did all she could to re-unite him with his parents, but sadly the parent birds didn’t continue to feed him. Without help Squirmy would not have survived, so he was admitted to the Australian Wildlife Hospital. He will now go out to a qualified bird rehabilitator to be raised until he is able to be released successfully back to the wild.

So remember, on finding a young bird on the ground:
1. Check to see if the youngster is injured; if so take the patient to the Australian Wildlife Hospital (if you are unsure a vet can assess the youngster).

2. Look to see if there is a nest/siblings/parents close by.

3. If the youngster is uninjured, the best thing to do is simply place the youngster up in the original nest, (if needed, a make-shift nest made from an old ice-cream basin with drainage holes in the base will suffice, as long as you tie it securely to a branch in the nest tree and place a stick down into the basin so the youngster can climb out when ready).

4. And finally, make sure the youngster is out of reach of any passing dogs or cats, and stand well back and watch to see if the parents come down to feed. Most times the parents will continue to feed and the youngster’s attempts at flight will improve as the days pass. Some youngsters may need a helping hand more than once.

Call the Australian Wildlife Hospital on 1300 369 652 for all wildlife emergencies.

 

This entry was posted on Friday, October 16th, 2009 at 2:34 pm and is filed under Wildlife Warriors. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.