Deadbeat parents... dead babies

I think my finches are completely retarded when it comes to having babies and keeping them alive.

The same pair of Zebra Finches that layed bogus eggs a while back finally layed some more eggs right before I went away for Folsom. I was psyched and couldn't wait to get home to see if there would be little baby finches waiting for me.

When I got home I found two little, live, baby birds in the nest. AWESOME!!!

Not so awesome.

Seems the parents got tired of taking care of them and moved out of the nest into another one completely abandoning them. Ugh.

I searched the internet for what I should do and, basically, there was nothing. It is almost impossible to hand feed baby finches without accidentally killing them.

So I spent the next few days talking to the parent finches and trying to pursuade them to go feed their little babies. I guess I'm no St. Francis of Assissi because the deadbeat birds paid no attention. The babies got weaker and weaker, and the first one died. The next day the second one died. (It's the one in the photo above.) It's sad, but it's natural. You can't be mad at them for not being able to take care of their babies yet. They are young and learning.

I ripped apart the nest and left the materials on the floor and the neglectful parents started to rummage through them and use the pieces to build a new nest at their new homesite. Maybe third time's a charm.