Let me clarify the last remark. I dont want anything mistreated, I also dont want live poisonous snakes around me. My other statement sounded cold and not what I meant.

~Heidi

Heidi, it is not normal behavior for parents to just throw out their babies. Starlings are as good as any other nesting bird for caring for their chicks. Sometimes, however, mites or predators can force a nest apart. I've found baby starlings on the ground, covered with mites and to this day, do no know if the mite-infested chicks were cast from the nest to save the balance of the brood or just became so irritated, they squirmed themselves right out of the nest and hole.
If you and your hubby don't observe the parents feeding the chicks or abandon the now disturbed bird house, please recover the chicks and hand-feed them. They will take any good grade dog food. I use Pedigree adult food in a can. One can will likely feed all 4 babies a long time. E-mail me and I can help you as I've reared lots of starlings to adulthood, and now maintain 2 as pets.
You will also need some cotton swabs and a little petrol jelly to remove the mites from the chicks.

Thank you. :-)I was hoping you would see the post soon. We did manage to get them all back in the nest. I did not observe any mites while I had the chicks waiting for DH to take apart the house. I was checking for ant bites too. One lil fella probably wll die soon as his side seemed bloated...maybe from injuring something as he fell. The birdhouse is for bluebirds and does have a slope that the chicks may have wiggled up on and then out the hole. Mom and Dad starling were there within 5 minutes feeding them again. At least one of them was. The other parent seems to have a heck of a time getting in that hole(it was designed to keep them out)and just sort of stands around looking helpless. I just hate seeing fallen chicks and since I read on a bird rescue site that the parents will usually accept the baby even if you have touched them, I now return them to their nests. So far I have had good luck observing parents returning to nests that I have returned their babies to.

If it looks like I may need to handfeed any at some point I will let you know so you can help me. Don't know if I would be able to as I do work full time though. I didn't realize dogfood would be eaten by the baby starlings. I had to give my pet bird handfeeding "formula" from a syringe. Do the starling babies just eat solid foods like that right away?

~Heidi

Bird formula is not high enough in protein for starlings and most other wild birds. It's good for passerines, but insectivorous birds need lots of protein as chicks especially.
No, the touched baby bird thing is a myth. The parents will most likely reject disturbed EGGS but not chicks. Had you more time on your hands, I'd recommend raiding the nest and taking 2 babies. You are likely to get a female that way. I'd go to Lawton to get a hand-reared female chick when weaned. In fact, I'd take 2 females to pair to my 2 males.

I was going to clean out a nest and get 4-5 chicks, but my new job is way too time-consuming, and my little girl is not old enough to care for baby birds like that. Now, those starlings are fully weaned and are feeding with their parents. Oh well. Maybe next year.

Well, sad to say, I lost these babies. They were out of the nest again last night. I did what I could quickly and put the 2 I found in a soft lined box and set it in the tree hoping mama bird would find and feed them. This morning there was no sign of any of the babies. *sigh* And mama starling was out there making some forlorn sounds.

~Heidi

Hi! Sorry you lost your babies. As mentioned earlier, touching the babies/eggs is a myth-- most birds do not have a sense of smell (including starlings-- and this is why skunks are preyed upon by raptors since they can't smell the stinky musk) and thus cannot tell if you've touched the babies or eggs. What is common though is the parents rejecting an egg or baby based on something being wrong with it-- not fertilized, not healthy, etc. They will continue to toss the babies or eggs out of the nest as long as you continue to put them back. It's sad (to me) but I guess it's the way they ensure not spending time and resources on a chick or egg that will never be "right" or develop properly. There is another possibility which is just plain abandonment.

Julianna, starlings DO smell and use their olfactory to locate some of their food from man-made sources. True, most birds have little or no developed smelling, but in some species, there is no question their olfactory is as powerful as their hearing and vision.
Whether raptors actually smell the skunk musk or not is still debated. It is the nictitating membrane that protects thei eyes whenever prey is taken.
Well Heidi, I am sooo sorry to hear this. I was hoping for an extra hand-reared starling or two.

I really hate to sound like the bad lady...but you guys can have all the starlings (there are waaay too many) that hang around my house. I'll let you have the grackles, too. I regard starlings and grackles as vermin.

These two species are taking over OKC. They dominated my bird feeders and bird bath to the point that I quit using them. They eat my garden plants and poop all over my car.

I think they've taken up residence in my area because the next door neighbor always has dog food out, which these birds love. They will actually go into the dog house to get it. Linda

Well, if you read my other post also started about the time Heidi began this thread, you will see wild starlings also caused me some grief. To make things even worse, I could not find the exact varieties I lost because the stores had pulled all their vegetable seeds, saying it was "too late" to plant them. Baloney!