Sorry folks, no new pictures yet. However, I did stop in to see "Slick" and he is doing great. He is fully feathered, his wings are nice and long and in good working order, his tail is about half as long as it will get when fully grown, and he's eating three full syringes of baby bird formula now.
Unfortunately, the splayed leg is definitely splayed. Denise had been working with it to try to straighten it, but he gets out of anything she tries to tie it down with. It's a muscular thing. Everything works, and he moves the leg and all digits on the claw, but its all just going the wrong way. If it were fractured or dislocated, that would be impossible.
As a result, he likely won't be able to go back into the wild. She said that he would likely get picked on to death because he is different. In nature, I suppose a community of sparrows probably can't tell the difference between an illness, which could threaten the community, and a handicap.
He props himself up on that one leg, while the other hangs out behind him. She is now teaching him each day how to perch and introduced him to millet seed the yesterday, but its still too soon. She says it will take a little time for him to start getting curious enough to peck at it.
As soon as she sends me pictures, i'll upload.
