Part 1

I started trying to research what to do with the baby bird I found before I even got home, but my phone didn’t prove very helpful. Once home, I hurriedly found an empty shoe box and put a rag inside. I put the bird down inside and grabbed by laptop to start googling. Was I going to have to dig up worms? Was it a grackle? A dove? The bird started to utter tiny, pathetic-sounding chirps, and my mind kept going back to the time my mom had tried to save a baby bird, but it had died within the first 24 hours.

I could find nothing helpful online, which isn’t too surprising, looking back. Different types of birds need different kinds of care, so most helpful information is found for searching for your specific bird type. I didn’t know what else to do but take the bird in his shoe box to Petsmart and see if someone there could help.

I wasn’t feeling very hopeful as I walked in to Petsmart and approached a young cashier who looked utterly bored with life. I showed her the bird in the box as I asked if anyone might be able to help, and at first her face seemed to be saying Are you crazy? We’re just a retail store.. We don’t actually know anything about animals. But that’s not what she said. Instead, she pointed toward the fish wall and said there was a girl over there who could help.

I had to wait as the employee finished helping another customer. Then, I showed her what was in the box. She looked the bird over, checking under his wings and all around to see if he was okay. She told me he was a dove, which surprised me. Who knew doves started out so ugly? She also said he was very cold and dehydrated and hungry. She was very helpful in telling me just how to warm him but make sure he wasn’t too warm. She showed me the baby bird formula and said there were instructions inside. She said to use a syringe and aim toward the left side while I’m facing the bird because otherwise it could go into his lungs. She told me it had to be warm enough that it digests correctly, but not warm enough to burn through the sensitive crop. She also said that, most likely, he wasn’t going to make it no matter what I did.

I thanked her and told her that I at least had to try. The formula was only $10, anyway. So, I bought it and headed home.

The first feeding was quite an adventure. I didn’t learn until later that I wasn’t supposed to feed him while he was cold. I thought food would be priority number one, so I didn’t bother to let him warm up on my heating pad before pulling out a clean syringe that I just happened to have gotten from the vet the previous week to help give my cat his antibiotics. The formula was mixed and warm, the syringe was ready… And the bird…would not…open…his beak.

Aren’t they supposed to gape when they’re hungry?! Why won’t he open!?

I didn’t want to touch it! Okay, so it wasn’t diseased, but… I admit it, I was a bit scared of birds. And I knew I should limit human contact if the bird was to have any hope of being released, which was my full intention. But I soon realized I was going to have to get over my fears or the bird was going to die. I wrapped him in the rag and began to try and open his beak with my fingernail.

Most of the formula from that first feeding went…well…everywhere but his crop. Quite a bit of it actually ended up in his eyeball, which kind of worried me. I had no idea how to tell how much he’d actually swallowed, but after having to reheat the formula 3 times, I decided it was time for a break. I put the bird in his box again to start warming up and drying off while I looked at videos on YouTube of other people feeding baby doves.

I gave him rather un-successful feedings again several times that day, trying the syringe and eye dropper methods, before I finally got one good feeding in with the plastic bag method. And then, as it grew dark, I moved him to the guest room with the door closed (to protect from the cat), covered his box with a blanket to keep the heat in, and prayed hard that he would somehow survive his first night.

(Click for videos of baby bird’s first day with me: Baby Mourning Dove and End of First Day…)