# Help! My baby Starling Suddenly Refuses to eat!



## Andoledius

I have an Eleven Day old starling with me that i've kept for maybe 3-4 days now. 

So far, I've been giving him a diet of Iams Dry dog food (soaked) with applesauce, 600 mg of calcium (tums), and hard boiled eggs. However, the other day, he was beginning to show some strange signs. First he started to refuse the food i was giving him, and then he wouldnt eat altogether. I then switched his diet over to mostly mealworms (which is what he was eating today. Dont worry, i cut their heads off beforehand) and i came back 45 minutes later to find that he actually (or it looks like) regurgitated all the mealworms i fed to him.

Currently, its been about two hours and he's almost not eaten a single thing. Hes refusing both the mix and the mealworms, and im not sure exactly what im supposed to do. I know that starlings especially have a fast metabolism, so i dont want him to go very long without feeding :/

(Other than the fact that hes not eating, hes still perfectly fine in terms of his activity. Theres a small decrease in his chirping, but hes still very active and likes to crawl around on his "nest" when i come over to him)

I've also read the thread http://www.pigeons.biz/forums/showthread.php?t=11126 that was posted a while ago. I tried to get answers out of it, but its not telling me why exactly he should be refusing the mealworms :/

Thank you for your help D:


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## Pidgey

Doesn't sound good. Have you been here, by any chance:

http://www.starlingtalk.com/

Pidgey


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## Reti

Are you giving him 600mg calcium a day? I would think that is too much for a tiny starling.

We have a few members who know starlings. I'll send them an email.

Reti


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## Pidgey

Oh, I see they referenced that site in that thread you posted. Well, do you have any medications or veterinary resources? We recently have had some folks mention that they sometimes have problems with Coccidiosis for which they need a medication for that but you'd want a "fecal float" done at a veterinary office to confirm that.

Pidgey


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## Andoledius

Reti said:


> Are you giving him 600mg calcium a day? I would think that is too much for a tiny starling.
> 
> We have a few members who know starlings. I'll send them an email.
> 
> Reti


Actually, its 600mg in the formula (which makes quite a lot, almost half a bowlfull of food)

i just looked up some pictures (out of curiosity) and im thinking now that my starling is actually a baby Sparrow.

http://www.silverdawnrabbitry.com/images/Sparrow/Pet Sparrow1.jpg this picture looks exactly like my bird. Thankfully, they have the same diet, but im still wondering about why she regurgitated her food :/ I fed her again a couple minutes ago and she did eat, but not as much as she should be, or was.


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## littlestar

Andoledius, If your baby bird looks like this one then you have a sparrow. If your using the ST diet you do need to use the calcium in the diet. Most use the tums and flavor, but make sure it says 750 on it, mix that with 2 cups dog/cat food and make sure the first ingredient is chicken or turkey not chicken meal, 1/2 cup poultry mash, and one ground into powder and mix it all together in cluding the egg and apple sauce, but please do not leave it the food out as the egg will spoil fast. I'm not sure at this time why h/she throw up. Is this little one puffing up? If so you need to get to a vet asap, but make sure its legal to have h/her in your state, if you want let me what state your in and can let you know if you can have this little one. It's important that you try to get this little one to eat, but please stop giving it meal worms because it has no nutrition in it for these birds.


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## Maggie-NC

Could you be over feeding?


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## wildlife-rehab

make sure your pushing the food far back so he swallows it and always check after each spoon that it has been swallowed so not to overcrowd the mouth, they have a good habit of making you think they have swalloed it, 

if you take a pair of tweezers or what you have been feeding him on and squash some maggots and feed them to it, if he isnt opeing his beak take him in your hand and gently open the beak and push in the food.
he should be having at this age between 4-6 maggots every few hours, they do not need the mix at this age,naturally sparrows are insect eaters, and you will often see them weaving in and out of window ledges and such things picking up insects.

sparrows can be very funny to get eating, but as they are smaller than starlings it does not need as much as you were feeding it, which may be the reason he has started to throw the food back up, when baby birds are full they simply wont eat.
but all you can do is make sure he has had something to eat every few hours,even if it is just a small amount, at least you no hes eaten something.

good luck! and i hope hes ok.


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## Andoledius

littlestar said:


> Andoledius, If your baby bird looks like this one then you have a sparrow. If your using the ST diet you do need to use the calcium in the diet. Most use the tums and flavor, but make sure it says 750 on it, mix that with 2 cups dog/cat food and make sure the first ingredient is chicken or turkey not chicken meal, 1/2 cup poultry mash, and one ground into powder and mix it all together in cluding the egg and apple sauce, but please do not leave it the food out as the egg will spoil fast. I'm not sure at this time why h/she throw up. Is this little one puffing up? If so you need to get to a vet asap, but make sure its legal to have h/her in your state, if you want let me what state your in and can let you know if you can have this little one. It's important that you try to get this little one to eat, but please stop giving it meal worms because it has no nutrition in it for these birds.


really? i thought mealworms were mostly protein and fat, which is important for baby birds :0 

How long can this food stay fresh if i put it back in the refrigerater after every feeding? And also, where could i get this poultry mash? (the ingredients has chicken as its first ingredient, so im pretty sure its fine)

I live in Massachusetts, by the way.


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## Andoledius

littlestar said:


> Andoledius, If your baby bird looks like this one then you have a sparrow. If your using the ST diet you do need to use the calcium in the diet. Most use the tums and flavor, but make sure it says 750 on it, mix that with 2 cups dog/cat food and make sure the first ingredient is chicken or turkey not chicken meal, 1/2 cup poultry mash, and one ground into powder and mix it all together in cluding the egg and apple sauce, but please do not leave it the food out as the egg will spoil fast. I'm not sure at this time why h/she throw up. Is this little one puffing up? If so you need to get to a vet asap, but make sure its legal to have h/her in your state, if you want let me what state your in and can let you know if you can have this little one. It's important that you try to get this little one to eat, but please stop giving it meal worms because it has no nutrition in it for these birds.


Oh, and h/shes not puffing up. I supposed you could say shes fluffy, but thats because her back feathers just came in (shes not lethargic or acting strange, she just wants to sleep a lot...well, more than she did a couple of days ago)


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## wildlife-rehab

carry on feeding the bird mealworms, they are full of protein. it should only be having 2-4 every few hours as these are alot bigger than maggots.


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## Maggie-NC

I don't know if this will simplify things for you but try soaking a good quality dog food such as Science Diet Adult bites until soft but not mushy. Break off pieces of the bites and feed those to him, maybe 3 total, and wait a couple of hours and feed him the same again. You should also add some cut up grapes or cherries to his diet - maybe a couple of pieces (not a whole grape or cherry) at each feeding.

He should be gaping for you all the time to be fed. Also, he shouldn't be sleeping as much now. As they age they become more active.

Also, I would totally leave off the meal worms for right now, particularly if he is not gaping for you. Sometimes, worms are hard for them to swallow and I have seen them hold them in their throat because of this. I usually wait until they're a bit older to give the meal worms unless they're cut up.


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## Andoledius

Lady Tarheel said:


> I don't know if this will simplify things for you but try soaking a good quality dog food such as Science Diet Adult bites until soft but not mushy. Break off pieces of the bites and feed those to him, maybe 3 total, and wait a couple of hours and feed him the same again. You should also add some cut up grapes or cherries to his diet - maybe a couple of pieces (not a whole grape or cherry) at each feeding.
> 
> He should be gaping for you all the time to be fed. Also, he shouldn't be sleeping as much now. As they age they become more active.
> 
> Also, I would totally leave off the meal worms for right now, particularly if he is not gaping for you. Sometimes, worms are hard for them to swallow and I have seen them hold them in their throat because of this. I usually wait until they're a bit older to give the meal worms unless they're cut up.


Well, he still does gape at me to feed him, but he doesnt seem as eager to eat. Im thinking it might be because of how im feeding him(?) (putting it on a chopstick and sticking the food in his mouth when he opens) 

I'll try the science diet thing though  He hasnt gotten worse since yesterday though, which is a good thing. (i have been able to feed him every couple of hours) Im just not sure if hes getting enough. Hes fully feathered so i cant see if his crop/sack is full :/


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## Chris Y

If it makes you feel any better - I'm rehabbing a sparrow at the moment, and he too is a bit reluctant to gape sometimes. Not because there's anything wrong with him, just because he's afraid of me. 

He was found in bushes, starving to death, and I think he has a healthy fear of just about everything in the world, but of course that doesn't make him any easier to feed.

He's only about a week or so old, and he's on Exact (which works perfectly well in my experience), which I administer via a 1ml syringe. A lot of the time, if he's hungry enough he will gape, but the syring has to be presented to him slowly, or he spooks. If he refuses to gape, and hasn't had any food for a while, I simply open his beak for him (ok, perhaps 'simply' is the wrong word there) and pop the stuff in. Yes, you have to be careful not to aspirate the bird, but if you push the syringe far to the back of the throat, and slighty to the bird's left, it will be fine.

In fact, the sparrow I have here, once his beak is open, gobbles down on the syringe himself, making sure it goes directly into his crop. Actually, it's getting the syringe back out that's more of a problem! He won't let go


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