Wagtail chick in captivity

Wagtails are extremely brave birds, to the last defend their offspring. When they notice a predator approaching the chicks, they pursue it with loud cries, warning of the danger of those around them.

wagtail chick

After the predator is put to flight, the birds fly again through the dwellings, not leaving their offspring unattended for a minute. Of course, there are cases when the life of chicks is exposed to a serious threat. In this case, any not indifferent person will not be able to leave the still not strong baby on the street.

However, you need to know a few basic points if you have a wagtail chick in your house: what to feed, how to properly care for and how to provide the bird with a strong immunity, because its formation must be approached with maximum responsibility. Only in this case, within a few weeks you will receive from a fledgling lump a healthy and beautiful bird that you can release into a natural habitat with a clear conscience.


During their movement, you can see that these are very graceful and pretty birds. They walk on the ground quickly and carefully, shaking their heads with each step. At the same time, they try to keep their rather long tail as far as possible from the ground, because of which it is either in a horizontal position or slightly elevated above the ground, due to which the birds fully justify their name.

Their flight resembles an arc, that is, they either descend or rise. This is due to the rapid movement of the wings, which they often bring together. Their voice is not particularly harmonious, and is a simple, pleasant singing.

wagtail chick than feed

The back of the bird is gray, the upper part of the head is painted black, the forehead, cheeks and abdomen are white, the throat and chest is covered with a black spot. The wings are brown-red, the tail is dark, the extreme feathers, which are responsible for controlling the flight, are pure white, which particularly distinguishes the bird flying in the sky. In order to adjust to the chick optimal living conditions and the most appropriate diet, you need to know what the wagtail chick looks like. It is important not to confuse it with another bird.Young individuals are grayish, darker above and light below. The beak, iris of the eye and legs are black.


These birds make their nests in a wide variety of places. If wagtails live in the city, they build houses in niches, various cracks formed in buildings, and sometimes they settle right on the ground, preferring places covered from the precipitation by fragments of building slabs. Under natural conditions, they can nest almost openly, placing nests right on the coastal cliffs.

The most active building of nests falls on the last month of spring. The material for their arrangement is dry grass, moss, feathers or particles of tow and felt.

Masonry wagtail

Standard laying rarely exceeds 7 eggs about 19 mm long and 15 mm thick. They can be gray or blue-white shade, on top of which small spots are placed and lines of gray or black color. It is noteworthy that in some cases they are almost imperceptible against the general background of eggs. Despite the fact that the female incubates the babies alone, both parents take part in raising the offspring. The wagtail chick (the baby's photo is below) develops into the hatch already at a half-month age from the moment of birth.Adult birds continue to feed children even after departure for 10–12 days. During this period, the chicks hiding in the grass, while the parents know exactly where exactly each chick.

wagtail chick photo

That is why it is so important not to take any action if the wagtail chick has fallen out of the nest, except in cases where his life is in immediate danger, because the parents will be able to provide him much better care.

Some wagtails, having grown the first brood, immediately start the second clutch. A short time after the end of the nesting period, joint migrations of adults and young birds begin. During the flights the flocks spend the night in the thickets of vegetation. Departure to warm places begins approximately with the arrival of autumn. It is noteworthy that before this, wagtails often return to visit nesting sites.

Chick development

The wagtail chick, the photo of which is placed above, grows quickly enough, and by the end of July it reaches the size of an adult individual. The first rare plumage begins to make its way in chicks approximately half a month after birth.Nests of wagtails sometimes suffer from attacks of crows and forty, as well as cats.

Grown-up chicks need up to 300 servings of live food, as a result of which you can judge the amount of food that you will need to provide the chick. The daily diet of wagtails consists of crawling invertebrates, behind which white wagtails can and do fly away from the nest for substantial distances, and collect them in the same areas where it is searched for by other wagtails (but not simultaneously with them).

What to feed?

Nestlings from the first brood leave the nest in June and until the end of development they hide in the grass or on the lower branches of the trees. Chicks at this age are called outlets. They sit in the grass without moving, waiting for their parents to bring them food, but at this moment their life is constantly threatened by various predators.

If you still decide to take the found home, you need to know the answers to several basic questions that arise after the wagtail chick appeared in the house: what to feed and how to care for the baby? First of all, you need to take care of the most suitable for him nutrition.To do this, you can prepare a mixture of cottage cheese, invertebrates and grated carrots, rich in various vitamins, or purchase insectivorous birds in a veterinary pharmacy.

wagtail chick fell out of the nest

It should be the maximum to limit chicks from touching the hands. For this purpose, at first, when the chick is not yet aware that you need to open the beak for food, you can even use medical gloves. Power should be brought to the pecker with tweezers, if necessary, slightly pressing on its base. The nutritional time depends largely on the age of the baby, in any case it is better to respond to his behavior, because if he gets hungry, he will begin to issue a kind of squeak.

To feed the chick follows from the pipette, purified water. It will be useful to periodically dissolve various vitamins in water in order to maximize the immunity of the birds and prevent the development of viral infections.

Preparation of the optimal place of detention

Keep in mind that a wagtail chick in captivity is subject to constant stress. That is why it will be better for your pet if you equip him at home with a semblance of a nest to which he has already become accustomed.It is best to make litter out of wool previously examined for the presence of parasites, plant fibers and other soft material.

Try to make sure that the wagtail chick is not in a draft, because it is fraught with colds that the unformed immunity of the bird simply cannot cope with.

what a wagtail chick looks like

Despite the fact that the chicks develop quickly enough, it will be best to periodically place a heating pad wrapped with a towel or cloth to the chick. When wrapping, try not to use velvet material, because in this case it is likely that the chick will get entangled in it with its paws and damage the claw.

Bird sneezes

If you notice that a wagtail chick sneezes, as a result of which he spends almost all the time with his beak open, with his tail slightly shaking to the beat - which means that the bird most likely has a disease of the upper respiratory tract or lungs, which must be eliminated immediately. consult a veterinarian.

In most cases, the wagtail chick starts to hurt if the box in which he lives periodically falls into the drafts zone, or there is an excessive accumulation of dust around this zone that he inhales.Avoid keeping birds in the kitchen, because most modern dishes are equipped with a Teflon coating, which, when heated, emits harmful substances that can cause a lot of diseases.

wagtail chick in captivity

If a young wagtail sneezes, and its behavior remains active and the appetite is good, you need to pay attention to the openings of the nostrils. The narrowing of the nostrils and the formation of a wax-like plaque suggests hypovitaminosis and, as a consequence, the need for vitamin supplementation.


While caring for a wagtail chick and adhering to the simple rules discussed in this article, you can, with a certain amount of effort, grow a healthy and beautiful bird. In this case, the less you contact with the baby, the easier it will be for him to adapt in the future. Also keep in mind that releasing a grown-up baby at will is better in places of direct habitat of wagtails. So it will be much easier for him to join the natural habitat.

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