We now have three empty nests waiting for occupancy, and three nest boxes which are being used by house wrens. There’s a total of nine eggs in the occupied nests.

The Cow Pasture nest box is host to house wrens. There are three eggs in the nest.

The Explore the Wild nest box is empty. It has been cleaned and is ready for use.

The nest box which is located at the site of the old Bungee Jump has six house wren eggs in its remodeled house wren nest. This nest previously fledged six chickadees.

A cleaned and empty nest box sits at the entrance to the service road to Into the Mist.

The Woodlands nest, which has so far fledged three chickadees is now empty.

Although house wrens had built a nest in the nest box at the Butterfly House, they have yet to lay eggs.

So, we have three empty nest boxes, Explore the Wild, Into the Mist, and the Woodlands nest boxes. The Cow Pasture, Bungee, and Butterfly House nest boxes each contain house wren nests. The Cow Pasture nest has 3 eggs, while the Bungee nest has six.

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A note to the purists out there who may be cringing at the thought of house wrens being allowed to use a bluebird nest box. The nest boxes were installed to attract bluebirds, but I don’t exclude other species from using the nest boxes, they’re all part of the local avifauna. That said, I will remove house sparrows or European starlings from the boxes, they’re not native species. But so far, the need to evict those two introduced species has not presented itself.

Even so, house sparrows and starlings have filled niches in urban and suburban areas created by the removal of habitat once filled by other species. If you look around, both those species too, in reality, are established members of the local avifauna. In some locations house sparrows and starlings may be the only species available to use a nest box!