~Baby Bird in the Nest~
One year ago, on a lovely Friday afternoon, our sons had finished their online classes for the day. I had just hung up on a call for work. Our younger son paused to look into our finches’ cage, and he turned to me with a look I had never seen in his eyes.
“Baby bird!” he said in an excited whisper. “Baby bird in the nest!”
We had had two little eggs sitting in the nest, and a few days earlier I had started Googling, “Number of days for zebra finch eggs incubate.” I didn’t actually think they would hatch, but here was a broken egg and a new little baby bird.
We were parents or grandparents…or since our sons are the parents of the parents, we were great-grandparents? It didn’t matter. What mattered was that we had a new little baby bird. The next day we had two. It was astonishing and miraculous. Watching them hatch and grow has brought us so much joy.
This weekend the baby birds are turning 1 year old. It’s impossible and wonderful.
Let me take you back to the beginning, back to June 2020.
~How It All Began~
Our younger son has loved birds since he was a toddler. During the pandemic, while other people took up knitting and bread baking and snacking, he took up asking for a pet bird. He asked and asked, and at some point, I started wondering whether we should actually get a bird.
There are many reasons not to get a pet. But if you are going to get one, a pandemic seems to be as good a time as any. So, one day I let my boss know I would be spending my lunch hour getting pet birds at a local pet store. The boys and I masked up and headed off to get two birds.
“How do you know if they’re male or female?” I asked the young salesperson who caught them and put them in a box for us.
“Oh, you can’t tell without a blood test,” she said breezily.
That sounded legitimate. What did I know? We paid for our birds and went home to get them settled in their cage.
~It Doesn’t Take a Blood Test~
By the time we reached our second day of bird ownership, I was starting to think these two birds were male and female. Their personalities and behaviors were so different.
The white finch just sat contentedly on a perch, hardly made any noise, and ate constantly. The finch with the beautiful gray and brown patterns strutted around the cage, singing lustily—especially when the white one was eating.
I Googled “How do you know the difference between male and female zebra finches,” and right away I found photos of birds just like ours. You didn’t need a blood test. You could look at the birds and tell.
We definitely had a male and female bird. That wasn’t ideal, but what were the chances they would lay fertile eggs? Eggs that would hatch? With baby birds that would survive?
~Don’t Count Your Finches Before They Hatch~
Soon enough, Ron started building a nest in the cage, and Hermione started laying eggs.
Egg after egg rolled out of the nest and broke. Even though I didn’t want to become a finch breeder, I was sad to see the eggs break.
Our boys carefully rescued one egg as it was falling, returning it gently to the nest. That egg—and another laid the next day—were the two eggs that hatched on Sept. 18 and 19, bringing us our two little baby birds.
~A Finch by Any Other Name~
We waited to find out the babies’ genders to name them.
It took a few weeks, but we finally figured out one was a boy and one was a girl.
Our sons named them Bart and Lisa. I was relieved because that meant we could put the boys together and the girls together, and everyone would be happy.
So, we have two cages, one for the boys, and one for the girls, and everyone is happy.
~Watching Our Babies Grow~
Watching any baby grow is magical. Having baby birds learning to eat and fly and sing in a cage in our living room was unbelievably wondrous—especially for a family sheltering in place for so long. Our little finches were our world.
There was something especially wonderful about the fact that we had seen them come out of their eggs. We will never know Ron and Hermione’s birthday, or how old they are, but we know exactly when Bart and Lisa were born. Although we’re not sure which was born first, we have agreed as a family that it was likely Bart.
For a family formed through adoption, there’s something amazing about having been there for our baby finches’ beginnings. Each of the four humans in this family has an origin story, but none of us were there for one another’s first breath. But we were there from the very beginning with these little finches.
That doesn’t make us love them more. But the gift of being there from the very start is extraordinarily sweet.
~Our Finch Birthday Celebration~
When I realized our baby finches were turning 1, I knew we had to celebrate somehow. Finches are easy to celebrate because all they want is food and nothing new or different placed in their cage. I boiled corn on the cob for them—a favorite treat—and put their little bowls of corn and peas in the shape of a number one.
The finches didn’t care, but I think it’s clear that this was more about the humans than the birds.
For dinner, we ate cocktail (“finch-tail”) meatballs, deviled eggs, a finch-shaped veggie tray, (egg)shell noodles a sliced steak I served as “Make No Mis-Steak, We Love Our Finches,” and a cookie dough ice cream cake.
Why cookie dough ice cream cake? Because the humans like ice cream cake, and life with finches is so very sweet.
Celebrating your finches’ birthdays might seem frivolous or silly, but it’s certainly fun. Life should be celebrated. Birds should be loved. And Bart and Lisa should have all the corn they want on their special day.
Happy birthday to our little finches!
Find more quick takes on Kelly’s blog, This Ain’t the Lyceum, and enjoy a beautiful week ahead.
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