It is not harmful to baby birds to pick them up and return them to their nests, despite the common belief that doing so will cause the mother to reject them. Some birds have limited sense of smell, and many species primarily rely on visual cues. It is however still best to leave a baby bird alone, as the parents will usually be close by.

Before you pick up an orphaned bird (and if it is not in immediate danger from pets or traffic), watch it from a distance for an hour or two to see if the mother will return. Replace a fallen, featherless, baby bird to its nest. It is a humor12-myth that once you touch a baby bird the parents will not accept it. Birds do not have a well-developed sense of smell.

Finding a young bird triggers compassion and helpfulness in most birders, but the very best help you can give a baby bird is to simply leave it alone, or if absolutely necessary, to intervene in only minor ways. Infant mortality is high for young birds, and the strongest, healthiest chicks will survive even without human assistance, no matter how cute and helpless they may seem.

Do not give baby birds food or water. While this may seem counterintuitive to helping baby birds, young birds have precise dietary needs that can't be met with kitchen scraps, birdseed or other foods. Young birds need live insects for protein to develop properly, and their parents will feed them 3-4 times every hour to meet that need. Offering improper food can cause a young bird to choke or become malnourished. Instead, wait for the parent birds or a wildlife rehabilitator to feed the baby bird a proper diet.