The baby birds were hungry and looking for their mother. Tweetie was their only hope.
Lynda Friend keeps parakeets in her home in Chateauguay, Canada. She has some older birds. And Sweetie and Tweetie, a mom and dad. They had two older babies still in the nest, and four newly-hatched babies, only 2 days old. Sadly, Sweetie died unexpectedly.
Something unusual happened the day Sweetie died. Lynda told me that she remembers opening the doors of the cages to let the birds get some exercise. Usually she closed the door of the room when the birds were loose, but this time she was exhausted and forgot. She fell asleep on the couch.
She was awakened by one of the older birds, flying out and pecking her on the cheek. “You’re being unusually friendly,” she thought, thinking the bird was giving her kisses. Five times the bird flew out, pecked at her, then flew back into the room.
When Lynda had awaken, she’d found Sweetie dead in her cage. The other bird had been trying to alert her.
But now, she had to figure out how to help the baby birds. Tweetie was making sharp squeaking sounds. His head hung low, and he appeared distressed. “I’m so sorry,” she told him. Then she raised her gaze to the heavens and cried, “Lord, you promised to look after the lilies of the field and the birds of the air. So please help me to care for these baby birds.”
Lynda explained how she placed the four youngest birds in a box, mixed a baby bird food puree, dabbed some at the end of a toothpick, and pressed it to their beaks. They were so tiny, about the size of a piece of macaroni. It wasn’t easy. She fed them every hour, night and day.
Eventually she had to place the babies back in the nesting box so that she could rest. She looked at the two older birds, then at Tweetie. Could he step in and take care of all the babies? “God these are your creatures. Please help us,” she prayed. A peace came over her.
Two weeks later, the older babies were active and out of the nest, and the four youngest were healthy and all feathered out. Tweetie had taken care of everything he and Sweetie would have done together. He was a remarkable father. “No request is too small,” Lynda told me. “God cares for us all, even the tiniest birds.”
