Help needed wth young bird ...

... sadly my dear Calvos decided to honour me with this little chap today ...





I have him in a shoebox and he has moved around and seems to be breathing normally. I know zero about birds. Could it be a young pigeon as we have many wild and tame ones around here? I have mashed some frozen corn and peas with some cress and put some water in with him (both in flat containers, lids actualy). I have the cat carrier ready in case I have to tend to him for a while. He is about 10cm long.

Perhaps Kandy or someone else knowledgeable with birds can help on what I should do. Any advice will be greatly appreciated.

 

you need to mash up cat food or dog food and feed it of a paintbrush otherwise it could choke also it can digest and get all the fluid and nutrition it needs from tinned food,dump the food you have prepared and dont give water,looks like a dove but cant tell from pic

 

It looks like a dove , it wont feed itself , and it need seeds not dog food. mashed up and soaked then fed with a syringe without the needle in
If the cat ? has bitten it , cats teeth are covered in bacteria and Iam realy sorry to say but it doesnt realy stand a good chance without antibiotics it will slowly fade away , have you a wildlife hospital or somone that looks after wild birds animals ???
I know how upsetting it can be the two cats next door had a baby blackbird all the magpies and crows were going crazy , then I was going crazy as well trying to catch the cat all this at 6.15am just before I went to work !!!

Spruce

 

i help out in a local wildlife hospital feeding dog or cat food is standard practice with birds,im also qualified in dog cat and small animal management.

 

Hi So you feed doves with dog food ???

I used to keep pigeons/doves and if I had a sickly bird I would put the seed in a blender then add water then feed them if they coudnt eat, normaly this was because of bird strike ie sparrow hawk .

What else do you sugest

Spruce

 

It's a dove or pigeon squab...it is unlikely to beg and will have to be fed artificially.
Sit it on your lap and hold the head between your thumb and forefinger of your left hand and very gently hold the base of the beak.
Once held gently but firmly you will be able to open the beak with your other index finger.Now hold the beak open with your left thumb and forefinger while you pick up the food.

A mixture of soft pet food and mashed hard boiled egg would be a sensible diet...this should be dropped to the back of the throat in small balls...the chick will automatically swallow.The crop of the bird either side of the neck(Food storage sacs) can be gently felt by your fingers...these will fill out as you feed (A single crop with some birds)...don't overdo it,little and often is the secret.

You will find it easier if you prepare the food first into small balls that you can pick up with the tips of your fingers.So when you have the beak open you're not messing about and can just drop a portion in.

A proper hand feeding mix can be bought from any of the larger pet stores.

Doves and pigeons feed their chicks on 'pigeons milk' a preparation prepared by the adult in the crop...I would not recommend feeding seed to a bird that age.And I have successfully raised many young doves and pigeons.

 

Thank you Ruth and Spruce. Sadly Portugal is not the 'animal loving' country that Britain is so no bird sanctuaries that I know of and the animal charities are overrun with cats and dogs and donkies and they are not interested in birds.

I can't see if the cat bit it or not, no visible marks. Oh dear, I'll just have to make sure it is comfortable as I live in the country and it would be a minimum half an hour drive round trip to try to find some bird seed.

 

someone with half a brain and an ability to explain properly thankyou very much no spruce ive never fed a dove just wee sparrows,tits etc and gannets,owls,buzzards etc

 

took it the wrong way


sorry

 

spruce you need to reread my last comment i was directing the lack of half a brain to myself and meerly thanking raebhoop for so excellently explaining how its done :gaagh: then i was speaking to you hence why i started with "no spruce" :gaagh::wallbang::wallbang::wallbang:

 

Hi Victoria,Your little bird looks very much like a Juvenile Collared Dove to me and isn't far off fledging{leaving the nest}Not sure if you have had the strong winds that we have had here but he may have got blown out of his nest if it has been a strong wind that has knocked him/her off balance.

If you have any wild bird seed,then if it was me I would sort through it and try to find some of the small yellow pieces of maize that you often find in the seed or some small pieces of grain and try to get some of that down him{I will call it a he for simplicity}/When I found a young pigeon a few years ago I mixed some of the maize/grain up into a wet paste with some water and used a flat ended pair of tweezers to pick up some of the mixture and by using your fingers on the side of his soft beak try to open the beak and after holding the beak open with your fingers if you can get some of the mixture down his throat but no too much at any one time as it could choke him to death.

I also had some plain water handy and used to put some on the end of a teaspoon which I managed to get down him the same way as I got the food down him.You will soon know if you are succeeding as you will feel the crop at the base of his throat start to get a bit bigger.If he is near to fledging he might be able to take some of the seed himself which will show he is starting to fend for himself but probably he won't be able to feed himslef if he is still a bit too young to leave the nest,but looking at him I don't think he was that far off the actual fledging stage.

If it was the RSPB they would have said to leave him alone as his parents might have been near by but the chances are they will have flown off and left the little chap to his fate.

I have only just read the first post quickly so not sure if the meat route is the right way to go as I think pigeons are mainly seed or vegetable eaters but as I have never worked at a wildlife sanctuary can't really comment on what works for others

Please let us know how you get on.It is a pity I don't live nearer or else I could have took him on.

Here is a link I have found for you and it mentions frozen maize and peas,as I said they are grain and veggie eaters:D

Caring for a Baby pigeon - PIGEON and DOVE RESCUE

 

thats ok spruce

 

Hi Vicky, I hope everything is fine with you.
It is a young bird, but not so young because he has a lot of feathers, so chances of survival are more (unless of course he is injured and the bacteria spread).
I know that sparrows can feed successfully on cooked egg, perhaps it works for him. Try also some small worms.
Since he is young he is likely to want food every two or three hours.
If you want to keep him on the wild side so that you return it to nature one day, handle him very scarcely.
Good luck!

 

Wow, it's been busy here whilst I was talking to my sister on Skype who is visiting the UK (Bedfordshire) at our cousin's. Neither of them had anything constructive to offer!

Sorry, raebhoop, but you posted at exactly the same time as I did so I missed you post until just now and thank you for all that useful information.

Also, thank you Kandy for coming along with your always welcome good advice in these matters. I had to rescue him as he was on the kitchen patio with Calvos towering over him. We had some rain last night but we have not had any high winds. I am surrounded by thousands (yes, thousands) of orange trees, along with olive and assorted other fruit trees, the nearest being one meter from my kitchen patio, so he could have come from any of them, although I must say my cats don't venture far so it was a nearer rather than further tree. We have so many birds here, including Little Owls, that it is difficult for me to know who nests where.

Also thank you Mira for your thoughts.

He had turned around again and is now back the other way so I am thinking I am going to have to try to give the little darling something.

I will keep you all posted and, thank you all for your input.

 

Update ... update ...

I guess it needs a name (asexual as we don't know what it is) so it is Pássarinho (pronounced pas-ar-een-you) which means little bird here.

Update ... it ate ... :yess: It refused to open it's mouth for me so I had to call hubby and it immediately opened it's mouth but he has always been the one who could give medication to our cats! For the immediate moment I mixed a little cat food with the veg and rolled into little balls (6) and the little one ate it all. I shall have some egg ready for it for a later feed.

It has pood twice ... quite normal looking for bird poo! Appears to be havig a snooze now.

PS How can you tell a pigeon from a dove, please? My sister says that in Germany where she lives they are all called doves! There is lots of coo-ing going on outside on the phone/electricity poles at the moment (which is normal) so how do I know what they are?