Rehabilitation

I know that if anyone reads this post, they might be puzzled initially at the content, as it deviates from the usual rant I post, regarding the essential airheadedness of most of the population. Bear with me for a moment.
Allow me to show you a bit of my world- my wife and I are Wildlife Rehabilitators- we help songbirds have a recovered life after their unfortunate run-in with civilization, cats, or storms. Most of these unfortunates are little babies that would die if we did not intervene. We are different from other do-gooders in that we know what we are doing, what to feed a certain bird, what they need to go back into the wild, and most importantly, we do our best not to allow the bird to "imprint" ourselves as their parents.
This is harder than you might think, as some birds are easily domesticated, and all of them have little fear of someone who is feeding and raising them. We are essentially their parents, and although we try our best, there are some times that are more difficult than others.
One example is a present situation we have regarding a Gold Finch from Arkansas. Yeah, I said Arkansas- these knumbnuts on a trip found the bird as a youngster in the street, and rather than take it to a Vet, who is trained to work on animals, they brought it home with them. They fed this young bird bread and sugar water. Where on earth they think a bread tree grows is beyond me, but they fed the bird this, until they had a very brief, shining moment of clarity, and figured that the food they fed this bird DID NOT EXIST NATURALLY IN NATURE!
DUH!
So they brought the bird to the Veterinary Hospital my wife works at, and we took custody of it. We are attempting to re-introduce this mental cripple of a bird to nature, but it is difficult, as the bird now looks to people as the providers of food, and has no fear of people. This is not a good thing for this bird.
Yeah, it might seem cute to some that a bird lands on you, but this is not something that they naturally do in nature, and is contrary to survival instincts they need.
Another time we found that this family was trying to keep some birds alive by feeding the birds milk in an eyedropper. People, birds have no tits! Milk is not a good thing for them. Also, seed- eaters might not be able to digest insects, and vice-versa. It takes a trained person ( and one who is licensed by the Government, I might add), to begin to raise these birds so they can return 100% recovered to the wild, where they belong.
I have friends who do not understand why I quit hunting, and re-hab wild doves instead. Well, I know it probably goes against some manly code I have no inkling of, but after you have raised a few of them from egg to adulthood, the thrill is gone. I like to go on hunts because I like to be in the midst of nature, and I do not begrudge anyone either the right, or the pleasure of the hunt. For myself, I am content in what I do. I just tell my friends that without me, and others like my wife and me, there would not be as many birds for them to hunt.
It is a sometimes grueling job, especially for the smaller birds, who must be fed every 15- 20 minutes during the first days of their formative growth, and for others, it becomes rather specialized, with feeding tubes, and percentages of insect to seed mixtures. Most birds, the true junkyard dog types, survive on whatever is available during a particular season, others are more prissy, thus the annual migrations, as they follow the food.
The point I make here, is that most people do not know what goes on in nature, indeed some people have not been in the country, or seen nature up close and personal, so they are uniquely UN- qualified to take care of a bird that has fallen out of the nest, no matter how much their brat squeals " Mommy? Can we keep him?" NO you may not- first reason being that it is against the law, both Federal and State- second, the chances are unfortunately excellent, that you will permanently harm or even kill the bird with your ignorance.
The Bible commands us to be good stewards of this earth, and sometimes, as in government, the less you do, the better.
Children, do not try this at home.