be an ex-birder myself, and being very close friends with a biology teacher and naturalist as well-as birder, i have to say that is not always the case. i have picked up baby birds many times, and returned them to their nests and the parents just kept on feeding the open mouth. if you remove them from a nest for a long period of time, the parents might abandon the nest, in which case the returned baby bird will die. the mom of the baby mice took care of her babies...i watched her relocate them to a new nesting spot mere minutes after i returned them.

speaking of birdies...i picked these ones up too...mom and dad birdies kept taking care of them until they grew up. they had a hairy conniption when i got near their nest though i was dive-bombed several times. put the babies back...took a pic.

oh yes...forgot to mention those are Red-Winged Blackbirds

I thought that birds kill their babies if they have human scent on them... guess I was wrong!

yes maam

From what I have read, birds have really great eyesight, but a terrible sense of smell, so they are unlikely to pick up a human scent. Red-winged blackbirds are about the worst to deal with while they're protecting their nests. Years ago, some built their nest near the entrance to the building where I work. It was interesting, and sometimes quite funny watching those birds go after people trying to get into the building!

Red-wings are bad, but tree swallows are the absolute worst! They'll actually fly close enough to your head to hit you with their wing-tips! Then there are Ruby-throated hummingbirds. Picture a bird 2 inches long chasing an English Mastiff across a lawn.

BTW: The above infantile rodentia are neither mice nor shrew. They are short-tailed rats.
They are too large to be mice and the fact that the posterior(their a$$) extends beyond the hips is the big tip-off.

my snake wouldve enjoyed them dont call me mean, snakes gotta eat too

when I worked for a Hospital they wouldnt let us use traps
that killed mice or the sticky things either.
So we would set up metal box traps and whenever we would catch one
I was called . Because nobody else wanted to touch them.
any way I use to take them out back alive and set them free in a field.

But i would always sing.........Born Free. as free as the wind blows etc etc.

wow...the mommy looked like a regular gray house mouse..or field mouse...she was small...a rat? really? i am not familiar with the rodent crowd too much, so i believe you. as for those swallows, i know what you mean...try to brush hog a 50 acre field...they'll kill you! hummingbirds can fly in any direction at up to 70 MPH...