Hand feeding

Next door neighbor just came over a few minutes ago, slightly frantic. Right next to his back steps were two itsy baby birds. One was dead, and the other had its mouth gaping open for food. They'd fallen or been knocked from their nest. They were about like this one.

As Neighbor readied the ladder to put the baby back in the nest, I rushed to the worm bin and pulled out a handful of castings. I callously ripped a couple of worms into bits and fed the not-even-close-to-fledging poor baby, who gulped them down. Then Neighbor climbed up the ladder, Momma Robin screamed and flew away, and then the baby was back at home.

I hope it lives. I hope we did the right thing.