American Robin Dilemma! High Priority! Please read!!!?

Question

Hi there,

This is going to be a long letter, about robins, if you do not know anything about robins, could you possibly send this letter onto someone who can help me? If you do…please read on! Thank you!

On approx June 11, 2006 I watched a mama American Robin building a little nest in my bush from my window as I was watching TV. It took her about 4 days with little breaks in-between. On June 19, 2006 we went to look in the nest when she was gone, and we found three blue eggs in the nest. For 8 days we watched Mama robin be such a good mother to these eggs, sitting and waiting. Until Yesterday (June 27, 2006) when we came home we saw that one of the blue eggs had fallen to the ground and was cracked, the second blue egg was still in the nest, but was cracked, but the third egg was in the nest untouched! To make matters worse, Mama was no where to be seen, and there were feathers scattered ALL around the back yard. There were two different types of feathers. (I have the two types of feathers attached that I scanned). We suspect that Mama got into a fight with another bird while we were away, because she was protecting her eggs. It was extremely hot outside yesterday, so we knew that the last egg would be fine, sitting there. We waited for Mama to come back, it was becoming nighttime and it was getting colder, she wasn’t coming. So, knowing that mama wasn’t coming back, we took the matter into our own hands. We took this delicate blue egg, put it on a paper towel, and put it under two lamps. This morning we went to see if Mama was there, no Mama. If Mama does come back, we have decided to put the egg in the nest, for that is the safest place for it to be. We are desperately hoping that Mama comes back.

Know that you know our dilemma, here are the questions that we would appreciate to be answered:

1) We know that the egg has to be continuously turned, but for how long, do we need to do of this every hour? Does it need to be done during the night?

2) How can we tell that this egg is fertile? I read that if you drop the egg in water, and it sinks, it is fertile, if it floats, it isn’t. Is this true, would it hurt the egg, if I put it in water?

3) We have two lamps on the egg (not incubators). We took these two lamps especially because we know that they get VERY hot. After two hours, I wash my hands and touch the egg, it is quite hot. Should it Be Very Hot to the touch, hot, medium, cool, or no heat coming off of it at all?

These are my 3 basic questions. I know that we are taking a lot on, and that there is a great chance that the baby won’t hatch, and if it does, it may not live, but if stayed outside last night, it defiantly wouldn’t have lived at all. Any additional information on our situation, and if you know of any websites that have done what we are doing, that can help us out, we would really appreciate it.

As you can tell, we are defiantly animal lovers! I

Thank so much, I really appreciate your time,


Isabella Thomas

Answer 1

It sounds like the robins nest was victimized by a mocking bird.

Mocking birds will knock eggs out of nests in order to make it their own. If the robin caught the mocking bird in the act there would have been an altercation.

If a robin's eggs become under suspect in anyway, then the robin will abandon the eggs.

If you are able to get the egg to hatch taking care of a baby bird is a 60 minute an hour, 24 hour a day, 7 days a week project.

If you have heated the egg to the point where it is "very hot" then the egg is most likely dead. It should normally be just a little warmer than room temperature. (About 85-90 degrees air temperature.)

Answer 2

if the egg was very hot you cooked it. as for the mamma bird seems like either a mocking bird got her or a crow. call a vet and they'll be able to help

Answer 3

honey, call a vet in your area. ...better yet, call a bird breeder.

i commend you for all your work to help this egg - hope its fertilized - to hatch. good luck!

Answer 4

Update on how things turned out??

Answer 5

http://www.flyingsquirrel.howpeg.com/robins2004/robinslog2004.htm

http://www.bsc-eoc.org/national/nw_robinsheet.html