Well, it happened again.  Several times in my life I have found abandoned baby birds. It's always heartbreaking and usually ends badly. 

Yesterday I ended up with 2 baby Eastern Phoebe chicks.  I think they were victims of a parasitic Cowbird.
The Cowbird lays one egg in the nest of other birds.  The chick hatches faster, is bigger, leaves the nest early forcing the foster parents to care for it and abandon the tiny chicks that are their real babies.  We saw the Cowbird chick leave the nest.  The adults never returned to the nest that whole day as they were busy protecting and feeding the Cowbird chick.

So, my nephew and my son took down the nest that was built over the front door and brought it to me.
The two chicks were so weak and dehydrated and no longer lifting their heads for food, but thanks to the good old internet I found a site that told me what to do.  A little sugar water in an eye dropper perked them up enough to get them to beg for food again and.  I was able to feed them (ground up egg yolk, dried flies and oatmeal) several times  until dark and they made it through the night just fine. I got up at 5am to start feeding them again.  Ah...motherhood.

I've tried to warn Jake not to get too attatched because you just never know but for now things look good.
For the next few weeks we will be catching a lot of bugs. Isn't that what everyone does in the summer?

If anyone has any advice, bring it on.......