An Empty Nest

Once again, things have changed.

On Tuesday, June 11, I watched as the house wren parents flew to the box. But I soon realized there was only one chick. That chick had learned very quickly that if it stayed by the opening, it would get the food. When it went back inside the box I did not see multiple bodies moving around. I had figured there were two. Now there was one.

As I watched, the chick leaned so far out of the box I feared it would fall and be snatched up by a predator. It was not only eager for food, it looked like it was eager to investigate the world beyond the nest. This chick had developed nicely and was obviously eating well based on all the poop its mother was removing to keep bacteria out of the nest. This one is ready to fledge, I told myself.

Empty wren box, 2024
(Margo D. Beller)

I was busy with other things for the rest of the day, but when I came out Wednesday morning, the box was quiet. No feeding, no head out the opening. I hoped the chick survived.

Thursday morning when I walked outside the porch to the patio I heard the male wren singing, the female wren warning of my appearance and the chick begging. They were in shrubbery in the opposite corner of the yard from the nest. They would later move back and forth along the area behind the flood wall between my property and the neighbor's. This is the same area where last year's wren family foraged for a few days before scattering. Then, another pair (or the same one?) took over the box.

I am not sure how to feel about this year's pair having only one chick rather than the usual three to 10. Were there others that died because their sibling blocked them from getting any food? 

If you do a google search you will find lots of articles explaining house wrens, their nesting and mating habits. But one thing is obvious: In the wild, it is the strongest that survive. Chicks that grab the food live, their weaker brothers don't. 

It is the same reason why female cowbirds drop eggs into another type of bird's nest. These eggs hatch sooner and the chick grows bigger by grabbing all the food or pushing other chicks out of the nest. Then the cowbird grows, fledges and leaves to join up with other cowbirds. How they know to do this after growing up in another type of bird's nest is a mystery.

What isn't a mystery is that, for now, this year's house wren box is open for a new tenant.

The Secret Life of a Suburban Backyard (with two updates)

Who knows what goes on behind the picket fence?

The typical suburban backyard is not very interesting. The large lawn is mowed down to a small height. The weeds are either dug up by hand or bombed with chemicals. The shrubs are not particularly showy and designed to require little in the way of maintenance. Those with a fenced-in yard put the dogs out in good weather. Humans are only out there when they use the grill or perhaps play with toddlers.

Fawn 1, May 25, 2019 (Margo D. Beller)

Perhaps I am stereotyping my neighborhood but that's how my neighbors' properties appear to me. I doubt any of them know what the birds are doing in their trees and shrubs or the critters on their lawn unless they notice browsing damage or the waste left behind.

This morning I was distracted by three wildlife dramas I noticed taking place in my suburban backyard. One was quickly resolved, one is ongoing, one I don't know how it will end.

Drama One: Twin Problems

The first involved deer, this time twin fawns about a day old.

While most people think of Memorial Day as the unofficial start of summer, I think of the period as birthing time for does. I have found day-old fawns on the property every few years and I am usually on MH to get out and mow the grass before it can be turned into a nursery. MH likes to leave the grass longish so it will protect itself from the sun's heat.

But since I was the one who mowed the backyard only a week ago, I can't blame him for what happened when the rains made the grass grow back quicker than I expected.

I put out a bird feeder this morning and noticed grass matted down from a deer that used it as a B&B. I walked to the back door and listened to the many birds - robins, catbirds, cardinals, a few types of warblers. My reverie was broken when a big doe bounded across the yard into my ornamental grass garden, knocking over plants. I noticed the size and deep in my brain must've remembered another big doe. I shooed her away.

About 15 minutes later, I saw two fawns under the dogwood. I remembered the other big doe - the one who came to nurse a crying fawn that had been left in our long grass several years ago.

Fawn 2 (Margo D. Beller)

I don't know why but I went out to get the fawns to move off my lawn to someplace less open to the street. On their spindly legs they slowly went to a border shrub and hunkered down. I went inside. Later I went out and there they were again. One soon bedded down under the dogwood, invisible unless you knew where to look. The other, however, was far more active and started heading toward the street.

I have protection against grown deer and smaller pests like squirrels and rabbits around some of my garden beds but I didn't want this little thing to get caught so I went out to shoo it back to its sibling. To my shock it started after me thinking I was its mother! I ran back to the porch.

Later, I went into the front yard to make sure this fawn hadn't gotten caught in the netting. There was Mom looking at me from the lawn across the street. I was not surprised to see her about 15 minutes later leading off a fawn, preumably the one that had been under the dogwood. Since I didn't see the other one anywhere, I am hoping she took care of that one, too.

Drama over, at least for now. Soon the fawns will grow and, like any curious child, will come to explore. Any plants not covered with netting will be sampled, including supposedly "deer-resistant" plants. I've had many bites taken out of such plants and that's why this year what I can move are behind some kind of barrier.

(Update: I later found one of the fawns under my apple tree. I left it alone and went out for the afternoon with MH. I don't know which fawn it was but it was gone when we returned. I know the whole family will return after dark and bed down in the lawn until we can mow it.)

Drama Two: An Alien

For some time now I've been hearing the sound of begging from a forsythia shrub. Today, while repairing damage done by the big doe mentioned above, I saw the cardinal pair at my flood wall followed by a begging bird nearly as big as they.

Cowbirds struck again.

I don't like cowbirds, as I've often stated, because the female lays her egg in another bird's nest. This egg frequently hatches first and then destroys the competition. So the parents feed this alien until it gets big enough to feed itself, at which point it somehow knows to find other cowbirds and start the cycle all over again.

Male cardinal (Margo D. Beller)

By now I usually take in the feeders but this year I've been slowly decreasing the number, in part to allow the parent cardinals to find seed to give them the strength to find insects to feed this voracious youngster (cowbirds don't eat seeds). First the suet was removed and put into the freezer. Then the caged tube feeder came in. Now the house feeder remains. Few birds are coming to it when insects are so plentiful.

This cardinal pair, however, seems so dependent on the seed I provide the male is frequently on the pole as I open the back door to put out the feeder. The male feeds on one side, the female the other. Then the chick starts begging and one has to fly off to attend to it. There are no babysitters to help out this family.

Drama Three: Evict or No? 

We recently returned from a week away to find a strange situation at the house wren box I put out every year. The male, which had been singing up a storm in late April into early May, appeared to be gone. A bird I presumed to be the female would make a soft scolding call from a nearby hedge, fly to the box, go in and stay put for a long while. I wondered, is there a nest going and are the eggs hatched or did something happen?

The other day I saw the bird leave the box for a bush. I didn't see it come back.

Today, for the first time in a long time, a male house wren was singing around the backyard. It flew into the apple tree and around the box. It came to the opening and looked but did not go in. Significantly, nothing flew out to chase him off and there was no cheeping. The male wren flew to several places in the yard, singing. It came back to the box and again looked in without entering. Now, it is gone and I don't know if it will return.

My quandary - Should I empty the box so another wren pair can start over? Or, as MH said as I fussed about the twin fawns, will nature take its course?

House wren from another year (Margo D. Beller)

Several years ago, a chickadee took over the box before a house wren could find it. I came up my driveway one evening to find what looked like a squirrel tail streaming from the box opening. It was the chickadee's nest of fur. It had been pulled out by a wren, which soon filled the box with its stick nest.

But if there is already a stick nest in the box (filled with dead eggs or, worse, a dead bird), the wren isn't going to go to the trouble of pulling it out and starting over. It will just find another sheltered place. If I want another pair to use the box this year, I'll have to empty it.

For now, I'm leaving the box alone to see what happens. I'll let you know what develops next in this suburban wildlife drama.

(Update: I took in the feeder for the night and walked over to the box. An adult wren quickly flew out and scolded me. I apologized and went back into the house. So the box isn't empty, at least for today. But what will happen tomorrow?)

Birds I Don't Like

Every year, after the winter birds have left for their summer homes, catbirds arrive to make nests in my shrubs. My trees are filled with little birds that have found old woodpecker roosts  or other natural crevices to make their nests. The box I put out for the house wren every year gets a tenant.

These are summer visitors I welcome. Others are not.

This year I've discovered common grackles nesting in my large, unshorn juniper hedge that acts as a screen between me and my neighbor. Deer have decimated the bottom of this hedge, which is why I leave the top part alone. Black-capped chickadees and other birds roost there for the winter and I know cardinals nest there during the New Jersey breeding season.

Delmarva female Boat-tailed Grackle (RE Berg-Andersson)

So to have grackles does not please me. They are large birds that, when not paired for breeding, congregate in huge flocks that are frequently augmented by blackbirds, cowbirds and starlings. They descend like a black cloud on my lawn several times each fall and spring. If left out the house feeder would be completely covered. I have also seen grackles attempting to get at seed from my encaged feeders. 

There are people who like grackles. Their black feathers show blue and brown highlights in the sun because of the luminescence. Jack Kerouac's mother, Memere, loved feeding the "black birds" after Jack dragged her down to Florida during one of those times he wanted to get away from the notoriety of writing "On the Road."

It doesn't take much for a grackle pair in a tree to turn into a huge flock in that and surrounding trees, crowding out other nesters. Grackles are opportunists, and like starlings and house sparrows - other birds I do not like for a variety of reasons - they will eat garbage left on the street as well as the worms they can pull out of the ground.

So I am not happy to see the three grackles (a pair and a helper?) walking along my lawn or pulling insects out of the crevices of my trees. 

These grackles, as I said, are common grackles. Along the eastern coast there are boat-tailed grackles, which are bigger and whose tails look like hulls. Unlike the common grackle female, which is the same color as the male but smaller, the boat-tail female is brown, such as the one above. That is usually how I know what kind I am seeing. The third type of grackle is the great-tailed grackle, a bird of the southwestern U.S.

It might seem strange that someone who enjoys walking around and looking at birds would have an antipathy to some species. My husband says all birds are God's creatures and have to feed where they can (although he does run out to grab the house and suet feeders when grackle "invasions" take place). 

I see no contradiction. After all, there are people I dislike but I don't hate the species.

The only bird I dislike more than the grackle is the cowbird. There are three types -- the brown-headed that I see in New Jersey; the bronzed I've seen once, in North Carolina; and the shiny cowbird. My comments pertain to the brown-headed.

Male Brown-headed Cowbirds, Cape May, NJ 2015 (RE Berg-Andersson)

I've written of my dislike of this parasitic bird before (please see my post of June 12, 2011; unfortunately, the link doesn't work). Besides hogging feeders, the female lays her eggs in the nests of other birds, usually one per nest. The cowbird chick usually hatches earlier and is much larger. It usually throws the other eggs out of the nest and dominates the attention of the parents. Then, somehow, it leaves the nest and knows to join up with other cowbirds, starting the cycle anew.

There is nothing sadder than seeing a cardinal being chased around the yard by a screaming, hungry cowbird chick. I usually see this every year. Actually, there is something sadder -- the Carolina wren pair I saw in another backyard one year, feverishly trying to feed the screaming "baby" chasing them that was twice their size.

Like the grackle, starling and blackbirds, the birds don't "sing" so much as croak out strange noises. The male cowbird is black with a brown head, the female a dull brown. They frequently pick at things in large flocks on roadsides, either with other cowbirds or alongside grackles and starlings.

About the only thing grackles and cowbirds are good for is diversifying the species. But these birds are tough and crowd out the smaller and weaker. Like other bullies, they are in no danger of disappearing anytime soon.

Prejudiced? Guilty.