Hello lovely people of the Redditverse (and sorry for the long post).
The pic below is of my lovely friendly wild magpie (I call him 'Spotty') who I have got to know very well since our first lockdown back in early 2020.
As you can see, we have a lot of trust and he now waits on the handrail of my backdoor for his cheese (definitely his favourite, even over meat & peanuts).
All the family have become quite familiar with us but he is the only one (I say 'him' although I'm not 100% sure) that will casually take food from my hand, the others are more wary although 'mum' has cautiously taken food from my hand a few times.
Last year they had two fledglings that come to see us still and are still part of their family. It's been a joy to watch them grow.
But this year they had two more babies, one is fine, however, one is not, and I'm at a loss of what I should do. Little 'Bobby' as I have named him (or her) as he bobs up and down when he walks with a wing stretched out to balance, seems to have a broken leg, or at least a badly damaged leg :( He still has his fluffy down type feathering and a quite grey back, his chest feathers are also mainly down & mum only started bringing into into the garden about two weeks or so ago. The poor thing really is struggling though. He is much smaller & less well developed than his sibling, and struggles to walk. His mum will still feed him, he squawks like mad and she does come and give him food, but he seems to not be doing well at all. I will try to take a pic of young Bobby and his leg when I can.
Today, there were four, (mum, a juvenile from last year I think, and the two very young ones) of the crow fam, enjoying their cheese, I was throwing the cheese right next to Bobby but he really struggles to walk to get it, after mum had had her fill she did start feeding him. But when they left poor Bobby just sat on the grass, wings outstretched for around 10 minutes. He managed to take off, and made it to the Hills hoist (a rotary washing line) a few meters away and rested there for awhile, I could see him standing on one leg and wobbling, he was trying to use his damaged left leg too, but every time he put it down he had to lift it up again :( He did manage to take off from there eventually and I'm assuming he made it safely home.
I have read the pinned post about baby birds but he is not really still a baby, as he is flying around now. I'm not sure if I should try & catch him & take him to a n
