Last year I was too invested in a mama robin and her nests/babies. I was heartbroken twice. Her first nest must have been raided by something that took her eggs. She built a new nest. I finally saw her feeding her babies and then they were gone, taken by something. So I don’t want to get involved anymore! But…a robin built a nest on top of a motion/solar light that is under the eaves of my house. It is also inside the dogs’ fenced-in area. At first I thought, this is perfect. Nothing can climb up to the nest or even get into the fenced-in area. She will be safe and cozy. So I’ve been watching her sitting on her eggs and now I see her feeding her babies. Wonderful so far. Then I started to think. What’s going to happen when the babies become fledglings, drop out of the nest right into the dogs’ play area? I’m afraid the dogs will be waaaay too interested in a baby bird hopping around. Anyone have some advice? Do baby robins fly right after they come out of the nest or are they just on their own for a few days? Will they be able to fly out of the dog area? So now I’m invested again. And stressing out about it.
Nature can appear cruel. We have been watching a clutch of 7 ducklings on our pond that we saw the day they hatched. Ducks are precocial, so we’ve seen them swim and hunt for food from day one. Now at 3 weeks there are six. Previous years we’ve watched as 15 became 12, then 9, 6, 4.
As far as the dogs, my gf would temporarily alter the dogs’ play area. Two years ago we had a huge number of rabbit nests and we leash walked the dogs for a month. We also put chicken wire enclosures around certain nests and relocated any snakes we saw. Realistically, the rabbits we “saved” contributed to hawks, owls, foxes, etc eating well.
Do whatever makes you feel good. Personally I’d not interfere, but I like to see me gf happy.
They often can’t fly when they leave the nest, and then almost always join in the cycle of life for other creatures. When I was about 10 or 11 I found a baby robin on the ground under a tree in our front yard. I brought inside and my mother called the SPCA for advice. They suggested feeding it cooked egg yolk until it had grown more, then worms, and if it lived it would be able to fly soon. That was the case, in a couple of weeks the little guy flew out of the box in the bathroom where he lived. We let him outside and he flew away, and I’m sure lived happily ever after.
All I can suggest is look for baby birds on the ground before you let the dogs out. But it’s also the story of life on this planet. We and the birds in your yard are here now because we and our families were all survivors in a long running and challenging existence.
Three days ago I was pruning a small orange tree in our yard that was way too overgrown inside, and when I was nearly finished I discovered a nest with two blue eggs in it, wedged in at the junction of three branches. I didn’t touch it, and stopped working immediately. The nest and the eggs are still there, I haven’t been able to tell if the parents have been back. I’m afraid I disturbed the area too much and the eggs will not hatch. Sorry, bird parents, it was unintentional.
Don’t worry, that’s just a myth. Even if you touch the nest or the eggs, or hatchlings later, birds don’t abandon a nest over minor disturbances.
I’m not used to this situation with robins, but I have barn swallows most years nesting in the barn. When I realize the babies are fledging, I try to shut the cats in the house for the rest of the day; some of the babies will be on the wing immediately, but some of them flutter down to the ground and rest there for a bit. By the next day they’re all in the air. I suspect, but don’t know for sure, that robins are similar.
When I was a child, one year when cousin children were staying with us, we found a robin on the lawn that wasn’t fully fledged. We fed it (I don’t remember what), and we’d put it out on the lawn for a while each day and the parent birds would fly down to it and also feed it, not put off at all by our having handled it. It also lived to fly off.
If it took yours a couple of weeks to be able to fly, it probably fell out of the nest too soon, as ours apparently had.
– I have had to move a nest when birds made one in the roof of the produce washstand, because they often shit right after taking wing and I can’t have them doing that on the produce while I’m trying to wash it. I don’t think they’ve returned to those nests – maybe they didn’t like the new location, or maybe didn’t find it? – , and I feel bad about their losing the work that went into them. I’ve always gotten them before they had hatched babies in them, though once there was already an egg.
Simply doing that will not keep the parents away. The instinct to is too strong. I did read that they will know if the eggs aren’t viable and just leave them.
Nature. We have a house in a fairly remote area with lots of wildlife. A few weeks ago, as I was walking around the house, I witnessed a deer give birth to two fawns. They were the cutest things, attempting to walk right after being born. The momma was very caring, she was skittish of me and I hastily retreated and watched from inside the house.
I don’t give the fawns a high chance of survival, as the area is also home to a significant number of mountain lions. Who feed on the local deer and elk population.
Robins aren’t exactly an endangered species. We wrapped a coat hanger around the elbow in our downspout to discourage nesting. If a robin tries despite it, we’ll knock it down. Not as though there aren’t plenty of other places for them to nest.
I’ve been seeing a HUGE number of young robins just recently. I suspect the parents. and potential predators all gorged on cicadas, such that there are large and multiple broods, with high survival.
Walking the dog this morning we saw a fox chase a chipmunk across the street right in front of us. The chipmunk reached a tree, but the fox leapt up and got it, then trotted off to enjoy breakfast.
Our entire marriage we’ve had exclusively Border Collies. Any time a baby bird falls out of the nest, one of them will go sit next to it and yell at us — Hey! You in the house! Come and get this creature and take it somewhere safe! Hey! I’m talking to you! — to take it to the bird sanctuary or similar environs.
My house has been home to numerous nests. First, it’s part log cabin with protruding log ends that form great nesting spots for smaller birds. Old porches that were attached had holes in the eaves where birds nested every year. Our original bedroom was in one of those porches and we survived a couple of years of baby birds waking up at dawn to tell their parents they were hungry, but then we couldn’t stand it any more and sealed things up there. We didn’t seal up the porch on the other side of the house at all and eventually tore it down. We’ve spent most of our efforts getting rid of non-avian nests in the house.
I had forgotten about this, but there was a large multi-chamber bird house on a pole out in the back but it remained unoccupied and eventually we took it down. It didn’t look like the chambers were large enough for Purple Martins, or if there are any around here. Not sure what other kind of birds it might have been intended for.
Nature is red in tooth and claw.
Part of my job is to assess impacts related to the migratory bird treaty act, which includes robins and just about any other bird you will see in your yard.
I know, as a nature lover (as a kid I subscribed to Ranger Rick!), we want all the best for our feathered and furry friends.
But the cold hard truth is only about 15% of bird eggs ever make it to adult bird. An 85% death rate is hard to come to terms with, especially for those of us who watch the trials of life from our front porch–but that’s just reality.
My practical advice is not to sweat the outcomes of any individual birds/nests, but just to take a deep breath and accept nature for what it is.
A few weeks ago there were thousands (millions?) of frog eggs, then tadpoles in our pond. Most end up as fish food, of the ones that make it most are eaten by snakes, crows, herons, etc.
Just enough survive to fill the pond with eggs next year.
How sweet! Our Border Collie cross would always try to sneak up on any unwary birds in his yard and crunch them right down before we could get to him.
We have a spot under a balcony that’s apparently irresistible to nesting birds. I’ve gotten inured to the sight of helpless baby birds who’ve fallen or been kicked out of the nest. I comfort myself with the thought that the neighborhood roadrunners have to eat.
Last year we had a pair of robins in the garden (Erithacus rubecula - the European robin, not Passeriformes Turdidae, the unrelated North American bird)
We saw them at the feeder feeding a couple of chicks, but when they were still feeding a chick larger than them, we decided that they had been fooled by a cuckoo. They have not come back this year.
Sometimes the other chicks in the nest will kick out the weaker ones before they are ready. Kick them out to die because they are all compeating for limited food. The stronger ones will survive. Some will actually kill each other.
This insures that those strongest will survive to carry their genes into the next generation. Nature ain’t pretty. But over time this keeps the best of the breed able to reproduce.
It works from the bottom of the food chain right up to us humans.
Interesting fact… if you’re out in the yard and a momma bird is making an inordinate amout of squalking, it is probably tyring to distract you from a nearby chick. Dont look at momma, but on the ground nearby, and youre likely to see it.
For better or worse we fenced off the area under and around the nest. I understand that Mother Nature is cruel, but I can’t stand by and watch the dogs kill a baby bird if I can help it. While we were putting the fence up, mama bird was angrily carrying on in a tree across from us. When we finished and left the area, she came back and sat in her nest.
One year barn swallows nested in our barn right over one of the horses water buckets. My gf organized a project moving that horse into an adjacent empty stall out of fear a fledgling would drown. I hope the swallows appreciated our crazy efforts.
Hope your chicks fledge uneventfully.
Who else read this as “bam swallows” first time through?