Retired nurse Heather bandaging tail of hurt baby bird (8)
I believe the answer is:
nestling
'baby bird' is the definition.
(synonyms)
'retired nurse heather bandaging tail of hurt' is the wordplay.
'retired' shows that the letters should be reversed in order.
'nurse' becomes 'sen' (I've seen this before).
'heather' becomes 'ling' (synonyms).
'bandaging' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'tail of' indicates one should take the final letters.
The final letter of 'hurt' is 't'.
'sen' reversed gives 'nes'.
'nes'+'ling'='nesling'
'nesling' enclosing 't' is 'NESTLING'.
(Other definitions for nestling that I've seen before include "Young bird - snuggling" , "in a huddle" , "Sitting snugly" , "Little bird" , "Baby bird" .)