Baby bird may not be a boy first of all. So , instead of the silly name I gave 'it' , I just call it baby bird. ha.
Baby bird is getting ENORMOUS and quickly. It is almost every other day that I see something different about his body.
He now has an almost full set of wings twice as long as his body. He has not yet developed tail feathers though and that is the most important set. He can not fly with out them. Once he does get them, he can 'graduate' and move out
But his fuzz under his belly is almost gone. It is just around his legs now instead of being fuzzy from under his beak..
Him and my cats are getting along wonderfully actually.
Flash Gordon still makes a dive bomb at him every now and then but for the most part he just walks by him or does not even acknowledge him. Kitten the older one , will lay next to the bird and just watch him.
I have made him a perch out of one of my old clothing racks. I have a towel that goes along the bottom to catch the poop and several tiers with grit on them so that he can rub his beak. He bounces around on it all day like a little jungle gym.
It is time for his first diet change. At this stage, his paretns would begin to bring live food for it instead of puking the food into their body.
THIS part? Makes me squeemish.. hahhaha.
I have no problems feeding him dead frozen worms.. but now I have to do live meal worms and baby crickets. Blah.
So what I have done is graduate him from the wheat gluten/cat food mix and I now make a seed mix. I have wild bird seed mix wheat gluten nutritional yeast , blue corn flour and 2 powder vitamin mixes. I have a measurement that gives what he requires in his diet. Before , as a baby, his diet had to be high in protein. Now he can have a 40/60 . 40 protien , 60 seed, grain, etc.
I take that mixture, place it into the coffee grinder until it is powder, then add filtered water to it until it is a watery paste and this is his primary hourly feed.
2-3 times a day I offer live food. I place it in front of him and he IS interested in it.. he watches it.. and sometimes takes a stab at it , but for now it just is not registering that it is food. I use chop sticks to pick up what ever live stuff Im offering and drop it into his beak.
I think.. all it will take is once or twice him catching it while it is moving in front of him to catch the grip that what moves is food. Then I am hoping to be able to feed him nothing but live food and begin to get him used to hunting on his own and not relying on me to feed him.
Gosh.
This has been one action packed foster animal I tell you what
I see it every day