Baby sparrow

[COWLEY]

I found a house sparrow egg on Saturday with no nest around anywhere,the egg was hatching so I kept it in my hand until it was totally hatched out,made it a makeshift nest and fed it,unfortunately it died this morning,I just wanted to know for future reference if anything like that happens in future what should I give the bird for its best chance of living.incidentally,I fell in love with it for the fight it put up all along.

[Dogghound]

It is extremely hard to care for a young bird like this, even the experts struggle. You need to continuously feed it. Not sure what you would feed it on in captivity in the wild the adults feed them on insect larvae, they also regularly remove droppings etc, its very hard to simulate this. Hopefully young wont have this situation again. How long did you have it before it hatched?

[cara pace]

It's also important to keep it warm.

Do you mean the egg was hatching when you found it?

[COWLEY]

I had it in my hand for about 3/4 hour or more before it hatched fully and another 1/2 hour deciding what to do about it for the best.When I found it,it was on the patio actually in the process of hatching out.

[Picidae]

Originally Posted by COWLEY

I found a house sparrow egg on Saturday with no nest around anywhere,the egg was hatching so I kept it in my hand until it was totally hatched out,made it a makeshift nest and fed it,unfortunately it died this morning,I just wanted to know for future reference if anything like that happens in future what should I give the bird for its best chance of living.

I don't think you could have done much tbh - unless you were able to find the nest and return the egg ASAP. House Sparrows nest in eaves, wall cavities etc, so it could have been inaccessible to you anyway. It's possible the nest had been predated by cats, squirrels or corvids - I doubt the egg would have fallen far from the tree though to mix my metaphors! As Dogghound and Cara say, raising new hatchlings is an intensive and complicated process, requiring the right equipment/feed mix/temperatures etc. It's a hard enough job for professional rescue centres let alone trying it on you own with no experience. The only thing you can do is keep it incubated, fed and get it straight to a wildlife rescue centre within the hour.

[kris11]

I wished I'd have seen your post earlier as I have an incubator especially for this type of thing, then agasin you probably live a million miles away from me anyway. You did the best you could, well done