Thank you for the tips i really appreciate it. Im looking at this now from a different monitor than i had edited, and it looks a bit dark now. I might have to up the exposure a little bit.
Compared to the original the second image appears to have a purple hue to it.
The sky looks pretty real to me in the first shot, second seems off.
The sun wasn't on your side (literally) so I'd push a bit the exposure and try to brighten the shadows a bit. I think the birdie is still a bit too dark.
I took a shot at the original picture. With curves, I brightened up the picture a little. I raised the color saturation and contrast very slightly, then applied some unsharpening mask. All adjustments were small, but together seemed to make an improvement.
My suggestion: Lighten up the bird a little to get more detail. I don't care if the sky is turning out brighter as it is just about the birdie. Again, matter of taste.