Top Photo: Upper surface of American snout. Things happen very quickly in spring, flowers bloom and fade, plants shoot out new leaves, insects emerge, birds who’ve been absent half a year, reappear. Here’s some of those things and more of what has occurred over the past week. Daffodils are early season flowers that last but briefly. Bees emerge with little on their agenda but food and reproduction. It’s time to get a new nest started. Northern, or Dekay’s brown snakes,Read more
Posts filed in: Birds
Nest Box Update 4.5.22
Top Photo: Bluebird eggs. Every nest box on our six box trail has a nest within. Four are eastern bluebird nests and two belong to Carolina chickadees. We have a total of 21 eggs spread out among the occupied nests, 16 bluebird eggs, and 5 chickadee eggs. All but one nest with eggs had an adult incubating at the time of the inspection. We saw no activity at the nest at the Cow pasture, which contains 6 bluebird eggs. WeRead more
Spring Happenings
Top Photo: Increasing in number on the piedmont, green anoles are expanding their range. When I first started work here at the museum some 14 years ago, it was unheard of to see a green anole in the outdoor areas of the museum. It’s now a common sight. Even on warm, sunny, winter days you may run into one of these, largely arboreal lizards. So far this spring I’ve seen question mark, comma, mourning cloak, falcate orangetip, eastern tiger swallowtail,Read more
Nest Box Update 3.29.22
Top Photo: Bluebird nest with eggs. There are 10 eggs spread out along our six nest box trail. Seven of those eggs belong to bluebirds, three to chickadees. One nest, which had been started by bluebirds has been abandoned and reoccupied by chickadees. The Cow Pasture nest box, which last week held three bluebird eggs, now contains six. I saw neither parent while checking the box. There’s been work done on the bluebird nest in the box in Explore theRead more
All in a Day’s Work
Top Photo: Female bluebird prepares to exit nest box after delivering nest material. We have six bluebird nest boxes at the museum. At present, the boxes are in various states of development. Five have bluebird nest material in them, one a chickadee nest. One has eggs. As I walked through Catch The Wind the other day I noticed bluebird activity near one of our nest boxes. Just the day before, I had looked into this same box on my weeklyRead more
Nest Box Update 3.22.22
Top Photo: Eastern bluebird eggs from previous season. All of our six nest boxes have nest material inside their cedar walls. Three of those nests are complete and one has eggs within. One is a chickadee nest, the rest belong to bluebirds. The Cow Pasture nest box is occupied by bluebirds and has, so far, three eggs. The nest box on the service road in Explore the Wild has a half complete bluebird nest. Two years ago, this box wasRead more
Wrens in Vapor Rings
Top Photo: Prefab wren alternate nest house in vicinity of Vapor Rings exhibit in Catch the Wind. Each year at this time we check the air canons at the Vapor Rings Exhibit to see if they have Carolina wren nests in them. There usually is at least some nest material in one or more of the canons. If there is, it’s removed. If we catch it before there’re eggs in the nest we consider it a job well done. WeRead more
Nest Box Update 3.15.22
Top Photo: Bluebird eggs from a previous season. Over the past week, two nest boxes have change somewhat, while all the rest remain as they were last week. At last week’s inspection the nest box at the Cow Pasture contained a near complete bluebird’s nest. The nest is still in the box but hasn’t shown any progress, no new nest material added and certainly no eggs. The Explore the Wild nest box is empty with no sign of activity. Curiously,Read more
A New Beginning
Top Photo: A great blue heron, an old wood duck nest box mounting pole, and a stake with a blue flag on it. The heron in the above photo just happened to be on scene when the photo was taken and has nothing to do with this story. The pole with the predator guard (cone shaped object) is where a wood duck nest box had been mounted. The stake to the right is the location a new pole and nestRead more