This past Monday, Israel was able to take his day off so we planned something fun to do together.  Imanuel really wanted to do a “craft”.  So, in the morning, I went shopping and among many other things, I bought a 3-D Chalking Kit.  It came with plenty of 3-D chalk, stencils of jungle animals, 2 plastic 3-D glasses, a brush and sponge, and a couple chalk holders.  So, in the afternoon, we drew many pictures on our large circle driveway and watched them “pop out” with the glasses.  Micah didn’t really get into it.  He prefered going up and down front porch stairs.  But Manu had fun.

Later that evening, we had worship and put the kids to bed.  Then Israel went outside to bring all of the stuff back into the house, but he came in with more than the chalk set.  He was holding a baby bird!  It had been standing right on our chalk drawings and appeared to be all alone.  It wasn’t even afraid at all.  It was just sitting on the palm of Israel’s hand.  A couple times when Israel put his other hand close to the bird’s head, it opened its beak up.  So, I immediately went out to our garden to look for worms.  I found two and we tried to feed the baby bird.  It ate one.  Then I decided to look on the Internet to find out what we should do.  It took us to a link from Yahoo Answers and we learned a few things from a bird biologist:

1.)  If you find a baby bird on the ground and its nest may be nearby (-trees or shrubs nearby), leave it there because the mother is probably still around.  If it has fallen out of a nest and you can see the nest, you can gently put it back in.  If you can’t see the nest, still leave it there because the mother will still take care of the baby from the ground.

2.)  If the baby has feathers, it is probably learning how to fly, so leave it there!

3.)  Only handle the bird if you are positive that the mother has died and it cannot feed on its own.  Carefully take bird in but don’t try to feed.  Different birds eat different things – worms, seeds, fruit, etc.  Never feed human food.  Call local wildlife shelter immediately.

4.)  MYTH:  If you touch a baby bird, you will leave your scent and mother bird will kill or reject baby.  Birds actually have a very dull sense of smell.  Mothers will take their baby back so if you ignorantly touch/handle a baby, put it back where you found it!

So, considering the fact that our baby bird DID have feathers, it wasn’t injured, and there are a bunch of birds that nest in our many trees that surround our driveway, we immediately brought the baby bird back out and left him on the grass by where Israel had found it.  By this time, Imanuel woke up because we were making too much noise so he was able to see the baby bird too.  When he first saw it, his initial statement was:  “Is it REAL?!”  🙂  It was just so calm and never struggled or try to get away.  We took some parting pictures (& video): 

Anyone know what species of bird this is?

We left it out there and went inside.  However, Manu started getting very concerned.  He was wondering why we were leaving the bird out there all by itself.  I tried to explain that we learned that the mama bird was probably out there and she will take care of her baby.  And that we have no idea how to take care of a baby bird!  But then he was concerned because we didn’t know where the mama was.  Then in a fit of emotion, he burst out in tears and demanded that we get the baby bird back because we can’t leave it out there all by itself!  We promised that if it was still there in the morning, we would take it back in.  Then we prayed together and Manu asked the Lord to help the mama to find her baby bird. 

After Manu went back to bed, I kept an eye on the bird through our window.  After about 10-15 minutes of just sitting there, it ran a few steps and then FLEW into a nearby tree!  It must have been learning to fly!  I was so relieved!  And about a minute after it flew away, we heard Manu in his room burst into tears again saying that we needed to get the baby bird.  So, thankfully, Israel was able to go in there and assure him that we saw the bird fly to its home.  It was a happy ending. 

We thank the Lord that despite our ignorance, we didn’t do any injury to the bird, AND that we actually had the opportunity to see and handle one of God’s beautiful creatures.  It was almost a heavenly experience.  🙂 

So far, Daddy has surprised us with a large painted turtle and a baby bird (which we were able to release together)…what will be next??