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Found a baby Starling!

Oh yeah, anyone think he could take halves of very small pinks? I've got a bunch left over (snakes are on fuzzies) and I don't think his mother would have missed the opportunity if she came across them..
 
I heard a scritching noise in my woodstove one time, and opened the door to have a singed grackle fly out! Another time, I could hear scrabbling in the metal chimney. I climbed up on the roof and lowered a towel tied to my cave diving reel. The bird clinged onto the towel and I was able to get him out, and he flew away. He just couldn't fly when he was in the pipe. The cover must have been dislodged. I replaced it.
 
Question for those who have handfed birds before:
I've taken him to work with me and I've got a little bit of his bird food mash here.. When he cries I get a little out and feed him, but I think we're not always working together here, lol.

Sometimes when I feed him swallows it right down, other times he'll sort of hold it in his mouth and shake his head till he's spit it all out the sides of his beak. Am I not pushing it down far enough? Or is this fairly normal behavior?
 
Push it way down with your finger. With babies, I feed many times during daylight hours. They don't get fed at night. He'll probably cry every time you walk by him. If you still have Terri's e-mail, she could tell you the frequency. Feed him till his crop is full, then see how long it takes to empty, then feed again. That will give you the interval. And you'll have to wash him off so his face doesn't get all crusty, and he needs to be in a bowl-like nest, not on something flat so he doesn't get splayed legs, and you can rub his vent with a warm wet cloth to get him to poo. He will have the instinct to poo over the side of his nest.
 
Thanks Nanci.. I had formed a little 'nest' of towells but he just wanders off. I think the best I can do is make sure the towells in there are not smooth, that way he does have nooks and crannys all over so he ends up not flat. But positioning him anywhere is a no go, cause he just runs around alot..
I don't know how to tell if his crop is full, is that his belly? He does have a pretty full little round belly which is shiny and featherless, lol.
I thought I was probably not pushing the food in enough- thanks for that. He's gobbling it up more often now that I am.
He's at my desk with me and I just feed him when he cries- probably every 30 minutes or so. I think that's probably a good interval..
 
tom e said:
Thanks Nanci.. I had formed a little 'nest' of towells but he just wanders off. I think the best I can do is make sure the towells in there are not smooth, that way he does have nooks and crannys all over so he ends up not flat. But positioning him anywhere is a no go, cause he just runs around alot..
I don't know how to tell if his crop is full, is that his belly? He does have a pretty full little round belly which is shiny and featherless, lol.
I thought I was probably not pushing the food in enough- thanks for that. He's gobbling it up more often now that I am.
He's at my desk with me and I just feed him when he cries- probably every 30 minutes or so. I think that's probably a good interval..
Click to expand...
What I did with all the baby birds I had was lay a dish towel into the container I was keeping them in usually a plus size critter container. Then completly cover the surface of the towel with a paper towel. That helped prevent snagging. I feed my babies when they got older 6-8 weeks every 6 hrs. But every 8 wont hurt. And Nanci is right just feed till the crop is full.

The baby bird food in the pet stores is made for parrots but also for finches which have similar diet to any bird such as a starling,cardinal. I think it would still be the best choice and easiest to digest. But the older they get the more seed and mealworms even you could offer for him to take independantly But I think the handfeeding formula would be your best bet.
 
I do have the formula, it was the first thing I bought.. The FAQ at starlingtalk.com though recommends against using it. They said it's just way too little protein for omnivores like starlings.
 
i just rescued the same type of bird. He fell out of the nest and didnt make it over night but i gave him the best last day of his life. I gave him mushed up dog food and blue berries, i fed it to him with a seringe. I didnt want to take any chances with the bird flu! :)
 
Sorry yours didn't make it, it may have been the fall, or possibly dehydrated from the time it spent under the nest before you spotted him..
 
He looks about two weeks away from fledging- maybe less. Then he'll really be fun! He's still plenty young enough to imprint on you. His crop is right in the front, not down underneath. You should be able to feel it get fuller and emptier. If he's getting around, you might be able to teach him to drink water. You just dunk his beak in a shallow bowl- not long enough to make him gasp for breath- just a dunk. You can also see if he will copy you if you dip your finger in like you're drinking. That works well with pigeons and chicks. I wouldn't worry too much about water, though, as long as you are feeding a very moist food. Another way to tell when he's full is he'll just stop opening his mouth.
 
Yeah that's the cue I've been using, when he just stops eating. But his mom, who I can still hear from the kitchen feeding the other baby, flies back and forth all day one mouthful at a time. Sam kind of likes that schedule. He'll take one big mouthful from me and then no more till I go away and come back. He's pretty funny!
Is the crop kinda at the breast, or lower?

Boy I thought he was a good feeder before, today he's really kept me busy. Everyone in the office gets a kick out of him screaming when I open up the box to feed..:rofl:
 
I googled "Bird Anatomy Crop" and came across this image. The arrows are pointing at the crops on these babies.

kropf01.jpg
 
tom e said:
Yeah that's the cue I've been using, when he just stops eating. But his mom, who I can still hear from the kitchen feeding the other baby, flies back and forth all day one mouthful at a time. Sam kind of likes that schedule. He'll take one big mouthful from me and then no more till I go away and come back. He's pretty funny!
Is the crop kinda at the breast, or lower?

Boy I thought he was a good feeder before, today he's really kept me busy. Everyone in the office gets a kick out of him screaming when I open up the box to feed..:rofl:
Click to expand...
The crop will get real big and squishy after a good meal. The pic Raiyne showed you is pretty good.
 
Ha! Thanks for that, it's perfect! Yes I know it and I've seen it get big then.. As an old cook, I was having some trouble imagining it being there because I've never seen it on a chicken carcass. I was seeing that and thinking, 'but I think that's just the breast,' Guess the breast is a little lower, kinda merging in the same swell.

Edit*

I guess that was not the crop I saw.. Let me 'splain. I've just read that Starlings don't have crops! Ooops. At least I'm not overfeeding, lol.

From Starlingtalk.net:
"Also, that "stomach" that was referred to sounds like they are talking about a crop. Starlings do not have crops. The babies will just continue to beg until they feel full, generally after a few mouthfuls. Follow feeding instructions listed in the first URL link."

By the way, that was not sent to me, I just was digging through old threads there...
 
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Aww, he's cute! Glad to hear he's doing well
A friend and I raised three baby starlings a couple years back, they were so young that they had no feathers when we got them. We were feeding them on the chunked cat food in gravy on tooth picks, it worked great. I believe we were feeding them every hour as tiny babies, and as they got bigger and started trying to fly, they were getting fed morning, after school, dinner, and then before bed. They'll eat until they're full and then just refuse to eat anymore. They survived, and were released somewhere far from the neighbourhood so the kids couldn't find them again and torment them (cause that's how they came to our care in the first place). We tagged each of them and saw one of them a couple weeks later :)
 
Update

Well a lot has happened since my last post here.. Last night Sam's brother/sister was banging around a lot above the stove where the nest is. I didn't think much of it until this morning. I kept hearing this metallic scritching and scratching like he was banging against the exhaust tube for the fan. I looked it over this morning. The baby was caught inside the tube (!) and was sitting right on the fan blade. Every once in a while he was jumping straight up trying to get out, but just couldn't do it. The mother is now gone and seems to have given up on the nest.
I took the fan apart and got this little guy out while I was making Sam's food. He's about the same size, has more feathers and less of a rubbery beak. But the most shocking difference was how much more active he is. He really struggles when he's held, flapping his wings, pecking at me and screaming. It really got me worried about Sam who is much slower in movement, more clumsy and has his eyes closed much of the time.
I put the new one in a little nesting box and went to look at Sam.. and found out he died last night..

I'm so bummed about it, it's quite surprising how fast he grew on me. I've been with him almost every minute, and hand feeding him for the past three days. I think he must have been in that kitchen cabinet much longer than I thought and was probably dehydrated and or starving before I found him. I didn't know what bad shape he was in when I found him, until I saw the other to compare him to.

Any way this new one has been nicknamed 'Dirty Chicken' by Jen. He ate for me but doesn't open his beak the way Sam did, I have to open his beak, but he swallows every bite I put in his mouth..
 
Aw, that's too bad. Hopefully the new one will get tame, or else you can grow him up and he can fly away.
 
Thanks guys.. Yeah, if he won't get tame, I'll let him go. Unlike the other, he seems to really know he's a bird and not a person, probably already imprinted on birds. I had a cockatiel when I was a kid that came from a huge 'flock' in someone's backyard cage.. He hated people his whole life, lol. Not interested in a repeat of that experience..
 
Ok! This second bird (Dirty Chicken aka Chicken Little, Fried Chicken, etc) is doing great! He's now very tame and follows me around when he's out- even pecks me if I'm not fast enough with the food..
Now that I'm getting to know typical starling behavior, I really see where something was wrong with Sam.. He was so calm and sweet, and this guy is definitely none of those, lol. I get a kick out of him though.. He likes to stab his beak into the carpet and then 'pry' it open like he's expecting a nice fat worm under there.
Today he sort of flew for the first time, from my hand to my bed accross the room so he could poop on my pillow. Granted it was a downward trajectory, but not bad for a first attempt.

Also according to the folks on starlingtalk, at his age if I had any interest in seeing him released, he needs to be at a rehabbers ASAP so he can learn to interact with others of his species... That was just the permission to keep him that I was looking for.

It's a little early for it, but I'm playing Pogues songs for him on my tin whistle hoping he'll pick them up.. He seems to enjoy it though!

Pictures coming as soon as I can find my cable- I hate when that happens!
 
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