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Mottie to the rescue.

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Possibly. Hopefully. Please God!
Out walking today over my local country park and I was attempting to catch some tadpoles for my allotment pond. No luck again but we came apon the strangest thing. A baby coot or moorhen, floundering in the water. Sodden through and half dead. No sign of any other chicks or parents. Maybe the parent/nest was taken by a fox or it had been abandoned? I don’t know but I couldn’t just leave it. I managed to fish it out with my net. It was in a very poor state and I’m not holding out much hope. It seems much too small.

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I kept it in my hand to warm it up and drove home one-handed. The only food I had was some dried mealworms so I soaked them in some warm water and tried to feed it. It wolfed them down.


It’s now dried off and stopped chirping as if it’s contented with some warmth and food inside it. It’s also fluffed up a bit too. Still shivering so I'm going to keep it in my hand until it settles down a bit.

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Fingers crossed.
 
Youve got an older nestling with its eyes open so feeding every 30 mins to 2 hours Ive heard.

I believe you can overfeed them

good luck!
 
mashed dog food or egg with water . Not milk, bread etc. could even try a kibble paste. i.e. newborn puppy food.

a pea sized amount every few hours.
 
Well done for rescuing it and giving it a chance, I'm not sure I would/could have done that. It seems that dog food in small quantities will give it sustenance and hydrate it as well. If all goes well you'll be quite the sight around Hornchurch with a coot following you round like pavlov's dog!
 
I read something about not giving them water as it drowns them - they have to drink it themselves.
 
People do brave things to save animals. I once saw a German tourist jump into freezing water to rescue our drowning puppy. After he got out he said “here is your dog, keep him warm, dry him off and he will be fine” I said: ”Are you a vet?” “Vet”, he said “I’m fuc*ing soaking”
 
People do brave things to save animals. I once saw a German tourist jump into freezing water to rescue our drowning puppy. After he got out he said “here is your dog, keep him warm, dry him off and he will be fine” I said: ”Are you a vet?” “Vet”, he said “I’m fuc*ing soaking”
:ROFLMAO: :ROFLMAO:
 
Well, I’ve moved it on. When I first found it, I would have given it a less than 10% chance of surviving. I definitely saved it from certain death - either drowning or hypothermia. I warmed it up, took it home and fed it. It got much better and I think I could have raised it successfully but it’s a wild animal and it needs to live a wild animals life so I phoned South Essex Wildlife Hospital for advice and they suggested I should bring it to them. So I did.


When I got there, I said my goodbyes and took it to the door.


I had to wait outside in case it had avian flu so the vet came out to me. After checking it over, she took it from me and said they'd look after it. She said they get quite a few this time of year. In their hands, I'd put its chances of survival at near 100%


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