Black-capped Chickadee update...

Update to my April 16th post...

I'm sorry to report that the black-capped Chickadee has abandoned her nest and four eggs. I was able to established her pattern as to when she would roost and when she would leave for a couple hours and this is when I took my daily photo of the nest. I always made sure to do this after she'd rolled her eggs and only when she took her afternoon leave.

If these eggs would have been "healthy" and progressing as they should, they would have hatched by now and within thirteen days the chicks would have been taking their fledgling flight.

We took the opportunity to photograph the nest and eggs tonight to document the size. The photos just didn't do justice revealing the size of the nest or eggs with any scale. The eggs were 1/8th of a teaspoon. I only had a 1/4 teaspoon on hand and you can see that they are smaller than that (see photos below.) The nest was 2" x 2". I can also confirm that these eggs never materialized to anything more than yolks.

Both Paul and I are bummed, but it's all part of nature. Maybe next year we'll get some photos of live chicks...

Chickadees nest in entry

We're watching a pair of Chickadees that decided the lantern next to our front door would be a suitable place to build their nest.

I was sitting outside one day watching this pair gather leaves, pine needles and various other nesting materials and then taking off near the door. I was curious where they were packing off their cache and much to my surprise it was right next to our front door.

It's amazing how hard these little birds work to build a nest! This one took just about four hours and then half of it fell to the ground and within two hours, it was back up and ready for eggs. The eggs look big, but they're about the size of a marble. The opening of the nest is only about 3 inches.

Had I known they were going to build where they did, I would have rigged a camera and remote shutter trip, but by the time I saw the nest, it was not responsible to attempt the camera setup as it would have posed too much stress to the pair.

I hope to post photos of the progress. One-week ago there were two eggs in the nest and two days later there were four!

I'll keep you posted...

Julia