Flying Diaries- Charlie Lee and Pamela

Some will make it, and some won’t. Growing up is tricky.

QueenBirdNerd

Today I am doing two similar stories. I have missed a week of Flying Diaries and my monthly issue will be a bit late.

I’ll start with Charlie Lee. Charlie Lee was a baby magpie found at the side of the road by someone we knew. Hmm… I can’t say their name here so let’s just call them Birdfinder. We were not completely sure he was going to survive. We put him in a small cage at first but we got worried he would damage his wings so we put him in the aviary.

He was pretty young and wasn’t able to eat, so we had to encourage him. He soon got the hang of opening his mouth as we popped food inside. He thought I was his mother, and he came running whenever I approached the aviary. Magpies are insectivores, so we fed him worms, insects, and used some of the recipes on the Fauna Rescue website. He started to poke around in the dirt and hay we put out for him by himself, but he still squawked eagerly whenever I came near.

But Charlie Lee used to feel quite lonely. He was getting better though, although still not very balanced and we decided to try and reunite him with his parents. It was not a struggle to pick him up. He didn’t try to bite, because he trusted us. We took him to where he was found, and put him in a box so his mother would come find him. We waited for ages. Charlie Lee had gotten out but was not doing anything. Finally, we decided to go eat lunch for a while, then come back.

When we got back, Charlie was still there. He still needed his mother to survive, he couldn’t do it alone. So we had to take him back.

I was at camp when my parents decided to take him to the vet as we were still concerned he seemed unbalanced. It turned out that, sadly, he had a badly fractured wing, and had to be put down. It was actually good his parents did not find him, as he would not have been able to survive in the wild. Birds are very lucky if they don’t have a bad break. We have only had one bird that survived with one (Joan Lee). Joan Lee had a single, clean break but Charlie’s wing was shattered.

We now try to take each bird to the vet to be examined, as they may have issues that are hard to detect. Even the vet wasn’t sure with Charlie until they did an x-ray. In every other way, he seemed fine.

Pamela was also a baby magpie, found on the side of the road. She was on a busy road, and needed some flying practice. Other than that, she seemed fine.

We did not need to feed her. She already knew how to eat. We put her straight in the aviary and she was doing fine. We only kept her for a single night as we wanted to reunite her as soon as possible with her parents to give her the best chance of survival.

We were confident she could fly properly, so we took her back to where she was found. Usually, birds take a while to go out of their cages, but she did not take very long at all. She flew onto a birdbath, and we could see she was fine.

Success!

Queen Bird Nerd

PS It is always best to reunite baby birds with their parents as soon as possible. It is very important when picking up an injured baby bird to record exactly where it came from.