Citizen Science

The intense attention to nature that came about from Apps and websites that let you record various things has brought science of sorts even to back yard birders. You can monitor nests. The nest activity can be reported in eBird during regular eBird lists. These are bird lists by your location. If you really want to spend some time with it, you can join Nest Watch. It is free.

The address is:
https://nestwatch.org/

I  did it for one season with a single bluebird nest and a single tree swallow nest. It was too much work for 32 boxes that are 12 miles away from me! If they are in your yard, it is much easier. Plus, I got the same information they want with less work. I know how many eggs were laid and how many bluebirds fledged. If you have bluebirds, look up Bluebirds Across Nebraska to report your results. Only the number of nests and the number fledged is needed.

I do collect data on my boxes, and I have a summary of four seasons.

The birds seem to come up with the same number of success each year. 2018 was a good year, but I think there was at least one failed nest. Some years the expected total appeared after a few failed attempts, so the nesting went to August. I put in a wren guard on one box for the first time, and that pair will raise just one chick.

In 2016 I reported some 60 tree swallows fledged. In 2019 there were swallow nests in 11 boxes, so about the same, 60-65 nestlings fledged. Swallows will delay laying eggs if temperatures are low in May. They only catch flying insects. Bluebirds need caterpillars to feed to the young:

The low number of BB nests in 2017 and some movement of the trail in the North prairie inspired me to move some boxes. So the table really does not follow the same boxes for four years. On the North side 5 boxes were moved to the tree line. I get more bluebirds this way, but also more house wrens interfering with the bluebirds. The bluebirds in a good year can be done in June and the wrens do not nest til June and July. They could share. But they do not and the male house wren will go and destroy nests long before the wrens are ready to lay eggs.

Box 13 (see previous post)

One bird remains (Aug 4 photo) and the bird is ready to fly:

On August 9th I checked the box. Just a grass nest left. There was no sign of the extra blue egg:

The nest is clean. I had one other such a clean nest where 4 eggs had been. In 10 days the eggs did not have time to hatch and turn to full grown chicks, so I marked those 4 eggs as lost.

One chick remaining in nest boxes

The unlucky Box 13 pair have hatched one chick. It is several days old. The other egg will not hatch.

On the South side, nothing came of Box 2 eggs. There were four, but there were no signs that they raised any chicks (no poop), the grassy nest is clean.

All the other remaining chicks have left (Boxes 4, 7 and 10). So I in fact can do a tally now. Will wait for the last chick to leave before sending it in.

On your own for the next 10 days! And some confusion.

I'll be leaving the birds on their own for about 10 days. There are some eggs around, and in that time something will come of them or not.

South side: Box 4

Box 2 was checked, it still has four eggs. they will hatch any day now. Box 4 had the four young as last time. The eyes now have slits that will soon open. If they hatched on the 7th, the eyes will open the 13th, tomorrow.

Box 7

Three young are developing normally. They too will open eyes soon.

Box 10 

This was the confusion. I opened it twice, once getting a photo. Four tree swallows attacked me the whole time. I had to go home and check on photos of them. Are they bluebirds? Here they are earlier, one still an egg:

And here they are now, ready to fledge. Yes they are bluebirds, not swallows. The swallows just hate me for opening their box earlier.

North Side

The pair in Box 13 are still working on two eggs, now with wren guard in front. The two eggs have been there 5-10 days, I do not know how many days past 5.  The wren guard is still in place and the female was inside.

Five active nests through most of July

There are nests out there and the bluebirds are doing fine with no interference. I did put some grease on the poles of the active nests. I really don't have much reason to check them every week, but will nevertheless check them in a week. Due to the wren guard experiment. See below.

South side Box 4
The most successful pair are raising four, with four already fledged. The female brooded the young over the cool night. By 8 30 AM she had gone to "work."

Box 10
These are also a successful pair, now with four young getting pinfeathers.

Box 7 also had three young but I cannot find the photo.

Also on the south side were 6 young WRENS, with pointy bills.

NORTH SIDE

The pair in Box 13 ( I took wren sticks out once) built a nest and laid eggs for the THIRD TIME. Two eggs are there. The commitment to the eggs and the box allows one to take some safety measures to take care of wrens interfering. They break and remove eggs.

I put a home made wren guard. Do not attach one until there are eggs. It is supposed to hide the hole of the nest. Wrens and nearly all song birds act mostly by instinct. Certain behavior follows an observation. The wren sees the hole, it must go in! So this (and commercial products) is what people have come up with.

You cover the top so the hole does not show. The bluebirds will fly in from underneath. They do not lose track of the nest. I have to  check it in a week or after heavier rain. it will stand some rain.

The wrens have not destroyed hatched young, in my observations. You can take the cover off at that point.

We have...NEW LIFE!

(Click the photos for a bigger view)
Box 10 on the South side is easily checked from the path, and there have strangely been no wrens bothering this box ever. Perhaps because there were tree swallows next door for weeks.

I tried to take a bit of video, but since food did not come, he no longer would lift his head:

There are three fuzzy heads, if you check carefully. I check the South side 14 boxes by bike, though I have not gone past 10, since 14 likely has no new eggs. One box had wrens. I leave those alone if they have a nest or eggs. Will do a final check on boxes 11-14 in a week.

Other pairs were around, and they too have eggs, so we have now four active boxes.

North Side

The pair from Box 13 is giving it one more try, after losing two clutches. With the wren sticks removed, they made a normal grass nest.

Once in a while, I catch something worth while if I have the camera with me. Today a Grasshopper Sparrow:

Don't count your eggs before they hatch?

It's chickens I know, or chicks. But we'll just deal with eggs now.

OK, we have 13 bluebirds fledged. And there are new eggs in three nests. One has three, the other two have four. None of these are near where we have wren activity.

Well, we are going to count anyway. If all the eggs are successful, we will get a total of 24 bluebirds, which is then normal for these boxes for a year.

Still hesitant nesting

A pair of bluebirds (female here on Box 8) managed to raise one young almost without me counting it as a bluebird, in the middle of swallow nest attempts:

Swallows have raised their young and several boxes (still rather few) are ready to go soon:

And the remaining three Bluebirds (two below) in two boxes are also ready.

On the minus side, the two "napping" last week may have been in their last few hours (they were breathing) and died. The birds get no water other than in food. Caterpillars are often the food.

Bad May

So we are just now recovering from a bad cold May. About 24-30 swallows will fledge, and Bluebirds will add up to 13 in a week.  That's actually a bad number for swallows, and I do not have really good data year to year, but up to 60 from 15-20 or so nests is normal.

Rather Uncertain June nesting

What is going on? With possibly 14 bluebirds total, this could be the worst of four seasons I have run this project. Even when cold killed whole broods of bluebird young, they renested.

The typical timetable is here: Timetable

The remaining bluebird activity is just two nests with two young, such as these two that were at least breathing.

Odd to see one on its back but it was breathing. This nest had four eggs but only two made it to this stage. One nest on the North side keeps having four eggs in the box and the female was incubating. I wonder how long they will sit on eggs if nothing comes out of it? In the next 4 days the 14 day incubation is done. If they do hatch and raise four, then our total could be 18 raised and close to the 20-25 we expect.

TREE SWALLOWS

These were a bit odd as well. The parents are attentive and fly in and out of boxes. One pair seemed to be having well feathered young but I found two in the box today and they were not ready to leave. What happened to up to five?

what I am seeing a whole range of nests at this point. Where they should be:

Two odd nests with just one chick (this one was a bluebird) :

The box next door had one swallow, And a couple of boxes with just one or two eggs.

All in all it has been a poor  May for Swallows. Normally they pick up and succeed, even if late. Now many have just given up. The North side with the ponds and insects very close by is doing worse than the South side where the boxes are along a path. There is a creek there, no pond.

Success! 10 have fledged!

The box on the North side is empty, so now 10 have fledged.

One other bluebird nest on the North side has four eggs. On the South side a lot of activity, mostly swallows. But one pair of bluebirds decided to raise just two chicks, and another have three hatched, one does not show up. The fourth is an egg.

Swallow nests, up to 7 chicks, always look crowded:

Optimistically 10 young bluebirds will have fledged in a week

The Box 4 family took a risk, raising 5 young while others hesitated. Four of the five fledged a few days ago. The fifth, presumably the runt, did not make it. The blue feathers had started to grow, but there were obvious deficiencies and the bird was small.

The female parent is feeding the fledged young, she had food at one point, I just did not find the young.

On the North side, four are ready to fledge (Box 16) as can be seen

I presume two more fledged earlier on the South side, bringing the total to 10 with the four above.

Other bluebirds are at the egg stage. One nest on the South side had disappearing eggs and I have determined it to be a house wren at work. He put his sticks in the box.

Swallows are coming along finally, with three nests having hatched chicks. This nest caused some confusion for me, but with the feathers I presume it is swallows. It is too early for wrens.

The door flips forward, and as I had it open and no birds dive bombed, I took a picture. I rarely photograph the swallow nestlings. I will check it in a week, just to see some sign of swallow developing. They look large for just a few days old. Swallow nestlings out of the egg are very small.

Adult tree sallow near one box with young.

Box Four Family In Your Face!

The 5 youngsters are quite well, and as the box has a hole I am able to photograph through, this is what I saw:

They may be ready to fly out by next week. The other boxes seem to be a little slower in coming along. The box with two well developed young was a bit of a mystery. See my previous post on them. They were gone! The unhatched egg was still there. I am a bit unsure if they fledged. But with only two being fed, perhaps they grew fast.

On the North side, Box 13, unlucky two years in a row, lost all eggs this May. But there are four more eggs in it:

Box 16 on the North has four nestlings. They were a bit lethargic, and I did not see the parents around. It took some effort to determine that they were breathing. Let's give them a 60% chance to survive. I will see that box first thing next week.

Box Four Family coming along nicely

The five young hatched a week ago, and here is the mother coming out of the box. She had no food, she just wanted to check the chicks after I opened the box.

The young are fine inside. They had opened their eyes so they ignored me and did not raise their heads.

The dad is subduing a caterpillar on a post here, and brought it to the kids a few seconds later:

The female checks chicks

On the South side there are other nests with eggs and one with two young. They are the oldest chicks we have. Near feathered. The third egg never hatched:

On the North side, only Box 16 has four young, some pinfeathers but younger than the South side, eyes maybe closed.

This is their home. I put fancier numbers on these, so I can monitor the ones in the middle easier. I do not open many swallow boxes. But none had hatched. Too cold for a week.