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When spring begins to draw to a close and summer begins, the high temperatures cause birds to jump out of their nests, even if they are not yet ready to fly. There are other reasons why a bird might jump before the nest, like the attack of a predator.
Most of us have met a bird when we were walking down the street, and we took it home and tried to feed it bread and water, or even milk and cookies. But after a few days he died. Has this sad situation ever happened to you?
Even if it never happened, but you want to be prepared, pay attention to this PeritoAnimal article and you will find out how to feed a bird correctly, what to do with an injured newborn bird or what to do if you find a lost bird that can't fly, among other situations.
Bird development
The time from hatching to maturity varies between different bird species. Smaller ones generally mature faster and go from tiny newborn pups to adventurous youngsters in a few weeks. On the other hand, birds of prey or larger species remain in the nest with their parents for several months.
To achieve the sexual maturity, however, usually takes longer. In small birds it can take between one and two years, while long-lived species may not become sexually mature for several years. The sexual maturation process is the same in all cases.
When the hatchling hatches, it can be altricial or precocious:
- Altricial: no feathers, eyes closed, totally dependent on parents. Songbirds, hummingbirds, crows, etc. are altricial birds.
- precocious: are born with their eyes open, are able to walk almost immediately. Ducks, geese, quail, etc. are precocious birds.
During the first few days of life after hatching, all birds need a lot. take care of your parents, including precocious birds. Parents provide warmth, protection, food or guide them to food and defend them from predators.
In the beginning, the puppies eat several times an hour. Altricials are clumsy, weak and can't move much, to order food they open their mouths. As they grow and become stronger, they develop the first feathers. Precocious puppies are more independent from the start, they can walk or swim immediately, but get tired easily and are much closer to their parents.
As altricial birds grow, they develop feathers, open their eyes and get bigger, gain weight and can move more. In the end, they are covered in feathers, but there may be areas without feathers, such as the head and face. At the same time, precocious birds become bigger and stronger and develop more mature feathers.
Once the puppies have reached the adult size, several things can happen. In some species, the juveniles stay with their parents until the next breeding season. In other cases, families can be together for life. In other species, parents abandon their offspring the moment they are self-sufficient.
what bird eats
When we find an abandoned bird, the first thing we want to do is feed it, so we try to give it bread or biscuits soaked in water or milk. By doing this, we are making several mistakes that will cause the animal's death. Both bread and biscuits normally consumed by humans are ultra-processed foods, rich in sugar and refined oils, which are harmful to our health and deadly to birds.
Mixing food with water poses no risk, quite the opposite, because that way we make sure that the animal is hydrated, but the milk goes against the bird's nature, because birds are not mammals and the only animals that should and can drink milk are the offspring of mammals. Birds do not have in their digestive system the enzymes needed to break down milk, which causes severe diarrhea that kills the animal.
What bird eats depends on its species. Each species of bird has a specific food, some are granivorous (grain-eating) birds, such as goldfinches or bluefins, which have a short beak. others are insectivorous birds, such as swallows and swifts, which open their mouths wide during flight to capture their prey. Other birds have a long beak that allows them to catch fish, like herons. Birds with a curved and pointed beak are carnivores, like birds of prey, and finally, flamingos have a curved beak that allows them to filter the water to get food. There are many other types of nozzles related to a particular type of food.
With this we already know that, depending on the beak that the bird we found has, its feeding will be different. On the market we can find different foods formulated specifically for birds according to their feeding characteristics and we can find them in exotic animal veterinary clinics.
How to take care of an injured bird?
The most normal thing is to think that if we find a bird on the ground, it is abandoned and needs our protection and care, but this is not always the case, and removing it from the place where we found it could mean the animal's death.
The first thing we must do is check if heis not hurt. If that's the case, we should quickly take him to a wildlife recovery center, and if we don't know of one, we can talk to environmental police on 0800 11 3560.
The appearance of the bird we found will tell us its approximate age and, according to that age, what we can best do. If the bird we found still have no feathers and have eyes closed, it's a newborn. In that case we should look for the nest it could have fallen from and leave it there. If we don't find the nest, we can build a small shelter close to where we found it and wait for the parents to come. If after a long time they don't show up, we must call the specialized agents.
If you already have the open eyes and some feathers, the steps to follow will be the same as for a newborn bird. On the other hand, if the bird has all the feathers, walks and tries to fly, in principle we shouldn't do anything because we're facing a young bird. Many bird species, once they leave the nest, practice on the ground before flying, hide in bushes and parents teach them to look for food, so we must never catch them.
If the animal is in a potentially dangerous place, we can try to place it in a slightly safer place, away from traffic, for example, but close to where we found it. We will move away from him, but always watching him from a considerable distance to see if the parents come back to feed him.
If you find an injured bird, for example a bird injured by a cat, you should always try take her to a recovery center, where they will offer veterinary assistance and try to save her.
This article is for information purposes only, at PeritoAnimal.com.br we are not able to prescribe veterinary treatments or perform any type of diagnosis. We suggest that you take your pet to the veterinarian in case it has any type of condition or discomfort.