What to do if I find an injured bird?

When spring begins to come to an end and summer begins, the high temperatures cause the chicks to jump out of their nests, even though they are not yet ready to fly. There are other reasons why a bird may jump before the nest, such as a predator attack.

Most of us have found a little bird on the street, brought it home and tried to feed it with bread and water or even milk and biscuits. But after a few days it has died. Has this sad situation ever happened to you?

Even if this is not the case, but you want to be prepared, pay attention to this Blog article, you will discover how to feed a bird correctly, what to do with an injured newborn bird or what to do if you find an injured bird that cannot fly , among other situations.

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The development of birds

The time from egg hatch to maturity varies among different bird species. The smaller ones tend to mature faster and go from tiny newborn chicks to adventurous youngsters in just a few weeks. On the other hand, raptors or larger species remain in the nest with their parents for several months.

Sexual maturity, however, usually takes longer, in small birds it can take between one and two years, while in very long-lived large species, they may not be sexually mature for several years. The process of sexual maturation is the same in all cases.

When the young hatch, they can be altricial or precocial:

• Altricial – No feathers, eyes closed, totally dependent on its parents. Songbirds, hummingbirds, ravens, etc. are altricial birds.
• Precocial : they are born with down, eyes open, they are able to walk almost immediately. Precocial birds are ducks, geese, quail, etc.

During their first days of life after hatching, all chicks need a lot of care from their parents, even precocial birds. The parents provide warmth, protection, food or guide them to food and defend them from predators.

At first, the chicks eat several times an hour. Altricials are clumsy, weak and cannot move much, they open their beaks to beg for food. As they grow and get stronger, they develop the first feathers. Precocial pups are more independent from the start, can walk or swim right away, but tire easily and stay much closer to their parents.

As altricial birds grow, they develop feathers, open their eyes and get larger, gain weight, and are able to move more. At the end, they are covered with feathers, but there may be areas, such as the head and face, without feathers. At the same time, precocial birds get bigger and stronger, and develop more mature feathers.

Once the chicks have reached adult size, a number of things can happen. In some species, the young stay with the parents until the next breeding season. In other cases, families may stay together for life. In other species, the parents abandon their young chicks at the time they are self-sufficient.

 

Bird feeding

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 dipped in water or milk. By doing this, we are making several mistakes that will lead to the death of the animal. Both the bread and cookies that humans normally consume are ultra-processed foods, rich in sugar and refined oils, harmful to our health and deadly to birds.

Mixing the food with water does not pose any risk, on the contrary, because we ensure that the animal is hydrated, but using milk goes against the nature of the bird, since birds are not mammals, the only animals that should and can drink milk are the young of mammals. Birds do not have the necessary enzymes in their digestive system to break down milk, which causes severe diarrhea that kills the animal.

Each species of bird has a specific diet, some are granivorous birds (they feed on grains) such as goldfinches or greenfinches, which have a short beak. Others are insectivorous birds such as swallows and swifts, which open their mouths wide in flight to capture their prey. Other birds have long beaks that allow them to catch fish, such as herons. Birds with a sharp, curved beak are carnivorous like raptors and, finally, flamingos have a curved beak that allows them to filter the water to take in food. There are many more types of peaks that are related to a specific type of diet.

With this, we already know that depending on the beak of the bird we meet, its diet will be different. In the market we can find different foods formulated specifically for birds according to their feeding characteristics and we can find them in veterinary clinics for exotic animals.

What should I do if I find an injured or abandoned bird?

The most normal thing is to think that if we find a bird on the ground it is that it is abandoned and needs our protection and care, but this is not always the case and removing it from the place where we find it can mean the death of the animal.

The first thing we must do is make sure that he is not injured , if so, we must quickly contact a wildlife recovery center, if we do not know any we can speak with environmental agents or with SEPRONA , through the number 112 .

The aspect of the bird that we find will tell us the approximate age and, according to this age, what is the best we can do. If the bird that we find has no feathers and its eyes are closed, it is a newborn, we must look for the nest from where it could have fallen and leave it there, if we do not find the nest we can build a small shelter near where we found it and wait for it to parents come, if after a while they haven't shown up, we should call the specialized agents.

If it already has its eyes open and some feathers, the steps to follow are the same as with a newborn bird. On the other hand, if the bird has all its feathers, it goes and tries to fly, in principle we should not do anything, we are faced with a fledgling. Many species of birds, once they leave the nest, before flying, they practice on the ground, take refuge in bushes and their parents teach them to look for food, for this reason we should never catch them.

If the animal is in a potentially dangerous place, we can try to place it in a somewhat safer place, away from traffic, for example, but close to where we found it. We will move away from him but watch him from a considerable distance to see if the parents come to feed him.

If the bird we find is injured and we do not know how to treat a wound to a bird, we should always try to take it to a recovery center, where they will offer veterinary assistance and try to save it.

 

List of birds of Spain that we can find in the city

Next, we show you a list of birds that we can easily find in cities , depending on the characteristics of the city (presence of rivers or lakes, green areas, etc.) we will be able to see one or the other, or some that do not appear in this ready:

• Mallard Duck
• common martin
• long-eared owl
• lesser kestrel
• common kestrel
• Warblers (various species)
• redfish
• Cattle egret
• barn swallow
• Golden Swallow
• Sparrow
• Jackdaw
• Goldfinch
• white wagtail
• Cattle Wagtail
• Owl
• common chiffchaff
• gray flycatcher
• common swift
• pale swift
• serin
• Bunting