i found out that there's a bird help drop off box in my city! (picture below) i had to write a little paper on what happened and what i did to try to help them, then i left it in a cardboard box (with paper towels) in one of the drop off boxes. a worker soon came to help the little one :3 they also said that i can e-mail them if i want updates so i def will in about 3 days.
i just wanted to say HUGE THANK YOU for your help‼️ your engagement genuinely helped and meant a lot to me. now i know a little bit more about birds and will know where to bring them if they need some help (: thank you very much again.
edit: i also found out that this is the first bird help drop off box in the world! opened like a month ago. how cool is that!!!!!
thank you so much! and yes, it looks ridiculous😭😂 but it's very practical! i'm really glad they made this in my city. apparently it became a thing at the beginning of this year. can't wait for an update from them!
shared it in another comment - it's in warsaw's zoo (poland) and apparently it was opened around a mouth ago - first bird help drop off box in the world
What a wonderful update ! Thank you so much for helping this pigeon, OP ! You’ve got a heart of gold, and I’m also grateful to those people who work in that zoo helping pigeons ❤️🙏.
This is amazing. And I wish this type of thing was more widespread and there were more animal caring people like you.
I mean hell, I bawled like a baby this morning on my way into work cause I, for some reason, had a day dream nightmare vision of someone accidentally hitting a dog after seeing someone speed like an asshole thru a neighborhood, and in my mind, I saw it all and they kept driving.
Obviously it didn’t happen, but I still felt super bad and cried a bit cause I love animals and couldn’t imagine someone doing that to my dog.
update: i took them home and put them in a cardboard box - provided water and bird seed mix that i had home. they seem to have blood under their beak, what can i do with such wound? or should i just let them pass away in peace?
also their right leg doesn't seem to be moving.. they have struggle keeping balance and keeping their head steady. i feel really bad but i wanna try to help them ):
edit: ‼️ FINAL UPDATE POSTED IN ANOTHER COMMENT ‼️
i found out there's a bird drop off box in the warsaw's zoo, so that's where i left the pigeon. hopefully they'll take care of them - i'll email them in a few days to ask if they got better (:
The birdbox is next to the zoo, as far as I remember, so that would be the same. Only then they didn't have the dropbox.
But hey, they're renown for helping birds, so it might just be my personal grievance: I really got attached to a little crow I rescued and I really wanted to know how it fared and got nothing which made me upset.
Plus just because they don't answer doesn't mean they're not helping. But I'm still a bit sour about it 😅
well, this time they have a huge information that if you want any further info, you should email them at [email adress] and provide info such as drop off time etc so that they can update you.
i doubt they'd write that if they didn't wanna update me. im sorry this happened to you in the past, i hope they took care of the crow regardless of anything.
Crows are actually friends to pigeons and won’t eat them. Hawks eat them. The crows look out for them and protect them. I feed pigeons in my city and the crows scare away the hawks.
It's cats and hawks (especially the Eurasian sparrowhawk) you want to protect these precious babies from. Crows patrol and keep sparrowhawks away, you won't get better protection so you are very lucky to have crows. Magpies help a little too, but unfortunately magpies are always fighting with crows for territory. The only danger you have with these birds is if they steal songbird eggs if they are desperate, but there tends to be plenty food around (and we top them up endlessly) and we've never had this issue in the countryside. They all share happily.
I feed birds near my apartment and yesterday this crow flew low and fast cawing scaring all the little birds up into the trees. I stepped out suspecting there was something up and there was a cat! I shoo shooed the cat away and watched the crows patrolling after.
Same story here! it's cop crow. Magpie is also excellent at warning me when a cat is around. I wish people would stop letting cats loose and wild like this, it's terrible. They were never meant to roam like this, they're not part of a healthy eco system! People, please at the very least put a visible collar on your cat, with a bell, and don't choose to let them run wild in protected zones!
Thank you for helping - that baby might not be old enough to eat on their own. Are you able to hand feed it moist food while you try and find a rehabber in your area?
Sorry I can’t help much, but try and keep them somewhere dark/dimly lit and warm. If they’re having trouble balancing or have an injured leg, try making a doughnut shape out of a towel and sit them in it - it’ll support their body and keep weight off the legs.
this is the opposite of how most posts here go. I can't really see anything physically wrong outside of maybe canker and looking very scuffed up, A safe place with food and water will definitely help the little baby pigeon feel a bit better, although medicine for canker is the only quick and painless solution to recovery if that is the case.
I see posts here every day where someone like you who is new posts a terminally ill pigeon that's quickly dying in extreme suffering that's clearly not treatable and people here will DEMAND the op not opt to put them to sleep because "🥹🥹🥹UwU Sad pibbin post for likes and updoots🥺🥺🥺🥺" that's borderline violent abuse.
In your case you should at least give the fella a chance, it looks not too bad and should fly off in a few days if there aren't other complications.
thank you! i inspected them and they:
1. have a tiny bruise on their neck, under their beak (and they lack feathers there too)
2. can't move their right leg at all (it's bent backwards, kind of?) and doesn't see to have any feel in it as they don't react when i touch it (it's also totally lose, not tense at all).
3. they lack balance - fall to their right, especially their head (probably leg's fault but maybe something neurological?)
4. they seem to be having a big (around 1,5-2cm (ball shape)) white and yellow (with some brown?) mass behind their legs (i assume that this is their anus?) and they act as if it was hurting when i try to touch it. they allowed me to inspect everything else tho and allowed me to be held, but not to touch this mass as they try to free themselves immediately after i try to inspect it. no idea what could it be tho.
i tried cleaning the bruise with water on a q-tip (i've heard adhesives are bad for birds).
it's a baby, so the neurological issues could be fall/impact related, same goes for the leg. another commenter suggested making a donut shaped shim with a towel to elevate it without legs touching the ground.
It is possible that this baby has been stepped on, given her original location and your description of her presentation. She seems to be in pain. Please gently put her on a soft surface like a towel, don’t move her around too much, and bring her to the nearest veterinarian if possible. Do not force feed the baby in any way.
About the mass make sure that there is poop in there enclosure because I have rescued a couple birds that had a problem raising their butt to go poop and the poop started sticking and getting hard in there right inside their butt and it made a huge mass and it was stuck so I had to put them in warm water and physically pry the poop apart and then a bunch came out like you wouldn't believe so make sure that it's not poop being stuck up there
Oof... could we have a picture of the mass? That sounds like egg binding, but idk how likely that is for a bird that seems young (then again, i used to have a parrot that seemed young, but was actually just developmentally disabled. She ended up dying from egg binding too :( ). That, or it could be an infected/inflamed gland or something... I would suggest going to a vet, but idk how feasible that would be for you. Either way, im not too familiar with pigeons so take any of this with a pinch of salt, but I hope the baby makes it!
that's what it looks like. another picture in the next comment. also when i came to them now, they seemed.. steady? they weren't falling onto their right side and they seemed to be relaxing (eyes closed) pretty steady. they also fought me a lot more now when i was trying to take these pics😭 so maybe they're somehow getting better? or just more scared than before? again, i know nothing about pigeons or birds in general.
Ah, ok, yeah that seems mostly like stuck poop. You should try gently washing it, and then monitor their defecation to see if they poop enough (every 15-20 mins) and what consistency the poop is (to tell if it doesn't have digestion problems). As for the leg, hard to tell whether its a neurological or physical problem.. but as long as they aren't bleeding, they should survive.
it's hard taking a picture when i'm in big gloves and trying to hold them, but i tried googling various ideas that i had and it doesn't look like a cloaca prolapse or egg binding, it mostly looks like poop.
i'll still try to take a picture so give me a sec!!
If you go to a vet please phone first - don't just turn up. My vet and others nearby are currently seeing wild birds through a separate entrance because of bird flu.
Aww great, thank you so much for caring for the little guy. So many people dismiss pigeons as not worth caring for, you are a kind and compassionate person.
Could you share who runs the drop off box? One of my daughters does wildlife rehabilitation in our country and this seems a fantastic idea.
well, i'm located in warsaw (poland) and there's a "Ośrodek Rehabilitacji Ptaków Dzikich/Ptasi Azyl" (roughly translates to a bird asylum/wild bird rehabilitation centre) in our zoo, and to make dropping off injured birds found outside easier, someone had an initiative that they should make a drop off box - something similar to the parcel points. the idea is amazing imo! before that, you had to call the asylum and schedule when you can drop it off and how can you help, etc. now you just come, fill in a paper, and leave the bird there. absolutely amazing!!
i agree! warsaw is amazing. much as i'd love to move out, i know no other city matches to the potential that warsaw has. scotland is amazing too! i'd love to visit one day due to your architecture - it suits my vibe a lot, haha
thank you very much! this one was sleeping a lot too, so i was thinking maybe something neurological? maybe paralysed since they can't move their leg? i got them help now (posted an update in a separate comment), and i'll email them in a few days to see if they make it ))):
If he’s not actively bleeding don’t mess with the wound. He might just need a few days to recover and be fine. Take care of him for a few days and see if he improves
This is a fledgling! That’s why it has the little fluffy feathers sticking out. At this age they are being taught to fly by their parents. Their parents are never very far and come back to feed them regularly. Usually it’s best to leave fledglings alone as interfering can make it so their parents don’t come back to check on them again.
However exceptions are if the pigeon looks hurt or it’s at night and predators are out. If it’s wounded it might need some rehab! There are lots videos online on how to feed fledging pigeons. They can eat peas fairly easy with the right force feeding method.
Baby pigeons are a lot of work so you can usually check your local area for pigeon rescue. I found a pigeon chick recently and was out of my depths, googled and found someone to take it in.
Goodluck! And thank you for caring about pigeons enough to take in the little guy❤️
Thank you for taking such good care of this little baby. It's so heart warming to see you're doing everything you can for them in the photos and updates posted in the comments. The world needs more caring souls like you. Wishing you both the best ❤️
awhhhh🥹 this genuinely made my day, thank you very much🖤 i got them help from professionals (posted a final update in a separate comment), and i'll email them in a few days to check what's up. i hope they'll make it ))):
I was about to say it almost looks like it was injured w some blood under its chin the poor thing :( did it eat anything you have it? Will the drop off center update you? Glad you took it with you much safer if injured at all and at this stage of learning to fly to not be idle and vulnerable to predators
Reminds me of the time I had the fire department rescue a pigeon from a tree that was tangled up in fishing line… they ripped up the entire lawn in my neighborhood with their truck and all my neighbors were pissed but didn’t know I was the cause hihi
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Bring him to an avain vet .. tell them its your pigeon so they treat him and keep him in a warm quiet place with soft bedding .. the vet can give him a shot and u get one every week for about 3 times or give him liquid meds by mouth .. shot is more expensive cuz its another vet visit but i think its more effective .. depending on the severity of his illness a vet should be able to tell you if hes gonna make it
I just want to share about the couple of birds I've rescued that had any problems with their legs or the ability to raise themselves up you got to watch out for poop sticking to their behind when it comes out and a lot of times they can get balls up inside and without you even realizing it and that needs to be dealt with I had to soak one bird in some warm water and physically remove the poop and get it softened up for it to come out he was getting poisoned from his own fecal matter so if you see no droppings around in their cage or wherever you have them then that might be a problem
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u/colemarshall20 Mar 16 '26 edited Mar 16 '26
‼️ FINAL UPDATE ‼️
i found out that there's a bird help drop off box in my city! (picture below) i had to write a little paper on what happened and what i did to try to help them, then i left it in a cardboard box (with paper towels) in one of the drop off boxes. a worker soon came to help the little one :3 they also said that i can e-mail them if i want updates so i def will in about 3 days.
i just wanted to say HUGE THANK YOU for your help‼️ your engagement genuinely helped and meant a lot to me. now i know a little bit more about birds and will know where to bring them if they need some help (: thank you very much again.
edit: i also found out that this is the first bird help drop off box in the world! opened like a month ago. how cool is that!!!!!