Monday, April 16, 2012

Baby Mockingbirds

Here is a video of two baby Mockingbirds. You may wonder why I have them. I think we can all guess who is to blame...

Smokey brought one in this morning, and I caught him with it in the dining room. Since he'd come in through the open back door, I put him outside the front door to keep him away while I dealt with the bird. The poor little thing had been shrieking whilst in Smokey's clutches, but did not look harmed. I put him into some tissues, in a small box, and he settled down to some quiet squeaks. I then made a call to Austin Wildlife Rehab to see what I should do with the bird. They advised me to call Austin Wildlife Rescue as they were closer to me and had a drop-in centre.

Just as I'd got off the phone, guess what? Smokey reappears with bird no.2... HEY! drop that and give it to me. I took the second bird and locked Smokey in the sun room. I put the new one in with his sibling; he didn't look harmed either. Since there was an hour before the wildlife place opened, I left the birds to quiet down and went for a shower.

On exiting the shower, I could hear wild squeaking... went back to the birds, lifted the tissue and this is how I found them! Hungry, I guess. The quiet one woke up later on, in the car.



I'd been advised that cat saliva is full of toxins and since they had been in a cat's mouth, the birds would not survive without antibiotics. So 40 minutes later - accompanied by two sets of constant loud squeakings the whole way - I was at the wildlife rescue place (it's that far of a drive away, unfortunately). They identified them as Mockingbirds and told me they naturally fall out of the nest and spend a few days on the ground, before learning to fly. These two should be OK with a bit of patching up and care.

Meanwhile, Smokey is going to be Watched...

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