What to do if you find a baby bird

Is it a nestling or a fledgling?

Baby birds, whether they need help or not, come in two stages: they are either nestlings or fledglings. Nestlings are not yet fully feathered and are too young to leave their nest; fledglings have all their feathers and are in the complicated process of learning to fly.

Nestlings

Whenever possible, if you find a nestling on the ground, you should try to return it to the nest. If you don’t already know where the nest is, look in the immediate vicinity: nearby hedges and trees or under the eaves of the nearest houses. The nest won’t be far away and there may be an agitated parent bird around as a guide.

When you have found the nest, handle the nestling with gloves and as little as possible, try not to touch any other baby birds that are still in the nest, put your foundling baby bird back into the nest, and go quietly away.

Fledglings

Fledglings often leave the nest just before they can fly; a couple of days on the ground, attended by anxious parents, is a normal part of their development. Keep your pets away, leave the fledglings alone and monitor the situation to be sure that the parent birds know where their offspring are. If a fledgling is in immediate danger, find it a sheltered space nearby and watch to be sure that its parent can find it.

Captivity

The RSPB says that removing a fledgling from the wild, putting it into any sort of captivity no matter how well-intentioned, reduces its chances of long-term survival in its normal habitat to almost nil, and should only be done in the last resort. You should only take a baby bird into captivity if it is sick or injured, if you know its parents are dead, or if you have monitored it for more than two hours and are sure the parents are not going to return. Then, and only then, contact your local wildlife rehabilitation centre or a local vet because it will take the help of experts to get the baby bird to any kind of normal adulthood.