ADVICE PLEASE budgie found

[BelovedBirds]

Just found a budgie lying on pavement by a dog walker, hurried over and picked him up
He's not so weak he can't fly but clearly not much energy
Offered water, doesn't seem fussed. I have him in an animal carrier. He is rather tame so clearly a lost pet. He's making lots of sad little chirps

Advice please, until we find his owners, what should we do?

 

[sourland]

Give something to eat - bird seed will do.

 

[BelovedBirds]

Give something to eat - bird seed will do.

He's got a dish with a bit of bird seed and a dish with a bit of water, I also tried offering some safe fruits but he didn't want them. I haven't seen him drink but that's not a definitive as I've not watched him constantly. He's sleeping heavily, waking up and preening, and then sleeping again pretty much.
Is this to be expected?

 

[Seaslug]

Not sure if this is helpful, but today I came home from work and slept heavily in a nap... didn't preen, though. IMO if the bird is an escaped pet, it probably had a scare and may have flew around a bit, both of which could be tiring. If you have any neighborhood online forums you may want to check if someone is missing a family member.

 

[Finchbreeder]

Budgies being an Aussie bird, are grass parrots.
Feeding seeding grasses (safe clean weeds from your garden) is the best way to tempt him/her to eat. They seldom touch fruit - but apple is generally the one they will go for if they do.
But as mentioned above, birdie may just plain be exhausted from flying round the neighborhood, so priority may be a nap.

 

[BelovedBirds]

He's definitely out of shock (or just well rested after his adventure) this morning, he's moving about, chirping, preening and overall acting more normally.
He's finally pooped and he's showing a bit more interest in his water. We'll grab some millet, budgie feed and a better temporary cage for until we find his owners.
They must be so worried about him

 

[BelovedBirds]

Update: no owners found yet, we've posted a bunch online and had some replies, but no matches, all dead ends.
I'm wondering if they're looking for him at all...
He's doing okay, we have a better cage for him for the meantime, a slightly better seed mix. He's also eating and drinking so that's great

 

[Finchbreeder]

From years of experience - sadly some people will try to claim what is not theirs - sometimes because they have genuinely lost a bird that is different - but sometimes to make a buck selling something they have no right to.
Also sadly - some people will get a bird for the kids (or themselves) lose interest and let it out - no consideration for the bird or attempt to rehome.
People who do that to birds should be kicked out on the streets and see how they cope.
Good people like you are appreciated by genuine bird lovers.

 

[BigBlueHen53]

Will you keep him?

 

[BelovedBirds]

From years of experience - sadly some people will try to claim what is not theirs - sometimes because they have genuinely lost a bird that is different - but sometimes to make a buck selling something they have no right to.
Also sadly - some people will get a bird for the kids (or themselves) lose interest and let it out - no consideration for the bird or attempt to rehome.
People who do that to birds should be kicked out on the streets and see how they cope.
Good people like you are appreciated by genuine bird lovers.

I appreciate that! We're doing our best for him.
Exactly my thought, we've been really careful not to post images of him so that we will have a photo or description given to us as evidence that we can verify. We had a couple similar birds suggested, but not matches. I wanted to avoid someone saying he was theirs just to get a free budgie...
But I've done my best to find his owner, we've made found budgie posts in so many places online and monitored all the online lost posts... We've reached out to the local community and asked around with people we know keep birds. You'd think if they're looking for him, they'd find him. Even if they're quite far away...

We had someone yesterday contact us and let us know that just over 3 weeks ago someone abandoned/released their budgies relatively locally. He may have been one of them, it has been warm and there are a lot of bird feeders out around here. Still, I struggle to imagine him surviving out there for so long? He was thoroughly exhausted when I picked him up, laying on the pavement next to cars, dogs and people. He's recovered really nicely now.