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ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Guilty! (1 Viewer)

Talon 1

Well-known member
I popped away for just two days. There are 3 sparrow nests with atleast 25 youngsters and i forgot to tell someone to top it up.
3 days later i returned , both tables where spotless and both large feeders totally empty.
I went to bed (thats 4 nights) i woke up and went out to fill the tables and feeders. I found two dead Young sparrows, not a mark on them so no cats or hawks. They had starved.

I won't loose sleep over it but i reared all those sparrows and due to my forgetfullness 2 died. I am dissapointed.

Please remember they come to depend on you , and thats all they no.
Please remember to get someone to fill them up. :-C
 
I can't really say that the birds didn't starve to death but I think it unlikely. In recent years i have read that most birds still get the bulk of their food from wild sources even when feeders are present. I believe thqt it was on FeederWatch when people were concerned about letting their feeders get empty if they had to go away during the Winter.
 
I know how you are feeling Free, it's horrible to feel responsible for the death of birds, when we try so hard to keep them fed and happy, but I would think they may have been sickly anyway, there must be other food around, if they died because of starvation, then surely others would have done so too.

I did something even worse two years ago - I left my guinea pig run out in the garden with the wire cover over the top, and somehow two sparrows had managed to get in to pick up some of the spilled food that had come out of the dish. I didn't go near to the run for a few days, and I found them dead in there, they had got in, but couldn't find their way out again. I was heartbroken. By my carelessness they had died of dehydration/cold/starvation. Must have suffered for ages too. I never, ever left that lid on the run again.

Another time, we found a drowned baby robin in a bucket of water, he must have leaned over for a drink and fell in. We were gutted about that too, as we had been thrilled to bits that we had a pair of robins nesting in the garden and saw the babies fledge. Never, ever leave a bucket full of water around without a cover over it, or a water butt for that matter. |:(|
 
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