My husband recently brought in a baby magpie that had tumbled from her nest in a windstorm. The first evening we had her was quite stressful as we had to convince her to open her beak so we could feed her. That night I had the inevitable anxiety dreams but, just before I awoke, I dreamt I'd gone upstairs to her box, opened it and found two baby magpies instead of one.

We knew her parents were nearby and we put her outside (at much personal risk, may I add ) each afternoon so they could see she was okay. We'd rung for information about if we could somehow give the baby back to her parents (to me, she seemed depressed) and were told we could make her a nest and put her as high up in the original tree as possible.

Eventually, using binoculars, we located their tree and quickly ascertained that there was still a baby in the nest and another that had also tumbled out and was being support by a lower canopy in the Norfolk pine.

Yesterday evening, in a nice little nesting box my woodwork teacher husband had made, we put her back in her tree. Then, we worried about her (as surrogate parents do).

This morning, there on the ground not far from the original spot we found her, was a baby magpie. We immediately dressed and rushed out to save her. But it wasn't her. It was her sibling, as I suspected it would be. We knew as soon as we got closer. He was much scrawnier and didn't know us and he was impossible to feed (she'd already worked feeding mechanics out*). Besides, she was still happy on her branch.

He'll be joining her in her box shortly. We'll be donning bicycle helmets before the feat, no doubt. The parents have been for a visit on our back balcony where he's safely stored in a pen hubby knocked up. They got a good feed and did the groceries for the kids while they were at it.

Those predictive dreams are great!
*If you ever get a chance to feed a baby bird, do it.