Raising a Rook chick - Advice wanted
Pretty much next to where I live, there is a rookery (or two, for that matter), and often we find young, dead chicks. My dad brought one in this morning, it has started growing the feathers, pretty much covering it's body now at the very least, and is an adolescent, but still requires feeding and all. So far, it is in a chicken hutch, my mum has gone out and will buy bedding and some dry mealworms that we will soak in milk for it, since it's not fully adult yet, and we don't want it to get choked on something fairly hard like that. Since earlier this morning, where I fed it a little (I had to go to church, and had only managed to leave it with a worm mostly dangling out the side of it's mouth. I am not sure what became of said worm, whether it dropped it or what) and gave it a good drink, it has become much more active, moving around (and away from me) much more, and has readily and quickly taken worms and some bread pieces soaked in milk. I've decided to call him (if it's male) Boris for now.
I'm pretty much the animal expert in my family, but any additional advice on trying to raise this sort of thing would be much appreciated. And Jesus, it deafens me when it crows, without warning, right next to my ear. Loudly. It almost hurts, even. |
It's a chick. They need pre-digested food. It's the avian equivalent of lactation.
You need to bite the bullet. Or to be precise, the mealworm. |
:
:
But I do wish you every success in raising the creature. What do you plan to do with it as it grows? |
Well, it's close enough to my face to bludgeon my ear drums.
Hopefully we can keep him/her as a pet. A pet Rook would be awesome. Now I just need to set up a squad of Attack Crows. Like attack dogs, but they fly :D More seriously, we do hope it makes it (it seems to have some sort of wound in it's side, but it doesn't seem to pay it too much attention, but a vets won't open 'till Tuesday at the latest because of the bank holiday). Bullet, it's not quite that young to require pre digested, it's readily eating what we're currently giving it. It turns out it doesn't like wet cat food, unlike our chickens...O.o We're gonna try getting some maggots from a fishing shop soon. It should love them. |
:
|
ITS BEAK IS ON FIRE!
no really, i wish you lots of luck in raising the bird. i do hope it survives. and as for the attack crows... |
The pigeon I was raising died for no apparent reason, right in my arms. It was eating seed, at first we got it's strength back up by delivering porridge straight down its throat via pipette. Then suddenly it all went downhill.
|
Maybe it got ill? But that sucks anyway.
And why is everyone obsessed with the whole zombie bird thing now? And attack crows=lol. |
:
:
But the idea itself sounds interesting. I haven't heard of anyone who raised a rook before. Appart from the crowing wake-up calls, how does the bird behave? Does he/she follow you around and stuff? |
It's being kept outside in a chicken hutch right now. We haven't had it for too long (since sunday morning), but he already seems tamer than he was, and very readily takes food (he'll open his mouth and skwark (Sp?) even if you just wave a hand vaguely over his head, whether you have any food or not).
Good news, we took Boris to the vet, and the wound seems to be quite old, maybe a week or so, and shouldn't be any real problem or anything, but still keep an eye on it. He's good a lively, and she also gave us the extra advice on how they become tame easily, teaching them to speak etc. Gendering is well nigh impossible, unfortunately, so we'll just assume it's a he, because Boris is an awesome name for a crow :D Apparently he's more of a crow than a Rook (I wasn't aware "Crow" was a species in and of itself...), too. Hopefully he'll get big enough, or we'll sort out some other arrangement so keeping him inside with the cat isn't a problem. Since they're quite smart, he should be toilet trainable (parrots are, so a crow ought to be). This is gonna be awesome :D |
A talking crow will be a fun pet to have. Good luck with raising it and post a picture if possible.
|
I was thinking of taking some photos at some point, actually.
|
A member of the crow family, such as a rook, raven, magpie, or indeed crow, has always been up on the list for a companion species at some point, along with various species of parrot (especially Scarlet Macaw), a toco toucan, fruit bat, kangaroo/wallabie or a platypus.
I do wish that roos had been domesticated and bred in the same way as dogs. That world would rock. |
If you can, why don't you try to start the trend now? And maybe with wallabies instead, as they are somwhat smaller.
Extra research seems to show him as a Carrion Crow more specifically, which apparently are often confused with Rooks, which explains that. |