So right in front my monitor is a window that looks out on a small holly. A pair of robins have built a good size nest in it, the one robin looked heavy with eggs or was well fed. The smaller robin comes and goes now. I suspect that is the male. The other spends a lot of time in the nest.
Is it likely she has already laid her eggs? If so why aren’t the alternating sitting on the eggs? I thought they needed to keep them warm. It is only 57°f currently.
Also I need to trim 1 branch of the holly as it is growing into my window screen, will this greatly upset the robins or can I just do it quick and move on?
The branch of holly needs to be in place. Its protection for the nest and spot was probably chosen due to this errant branch.
You are lucky to have the robbins so close. Cherish them. Their nesting period is only 6-8 weeks. They may even have a second brood if you leave them alone after the chicks have fledged.
Also try not to feed them close to the nest. It will attract other birds and predators observe where the parents take the food to. Magpies are devils.
Feed very far away from nest if you need to do it at all.
I don’t wish to hijack Nansbread1’s thread but I do have a related question.
Four years ago I noticed that a robin had built a nest in a flower basket hanging from the ceiling of my porch. It was kinda a bummer for the plant, it took me a while to figure out how to water it without drenching the nest (the basket is wicker so I filled a bucket with water and lifted the bucket to submerge the bottom half of the plant) but it was sorta cool to have a little birdie family living on my porch.
I don’t know if I can honestly say I can tell robins apart but that same hanging basket has given home to a robin nest each year since. A week or so ago I was fumbling with my keys to unlock my door when a robin landed on my porch rail and it chirped at me sorta imploringly till I realized I had neglected to move that plant outside after winter and now sure enough, fourth year straight robin nest.
How long do robins live? Is this the same bird or has this become a generational sort of thing?
My Robins needed a better building inspector.
They spent more than a week building a huge nest in a fairly scrawny Elm. The next week I went outside in a moderate-at-most wind (maybe 12 mph) and they were both screaming at me like I had done something horrible. I then noticed their nest was on the ground under the tree.
European Robins are a different species, but life expectancy seems to be pretty similar. They are noted here for being relatively unafraid of humans (they will come pretty close if you are digging, always keen to see what they can grab) but are very aggressive to other robins. You normally only have one in your garden.
I do indeed have one (male, European) robin in my (European) garden; it is an aggressive little sod. There may be a female as well somewhere in there, but I don’t see it.
American Robin sexes differ in plumage. The male has a blackish head and bright red breast. The female has a grayish head and paler red breast.
Many birds won’t start sitting on the eggs until the clutch is complete. The female lays one egg a day. If the complete clutch contains six eggs, they will start incubating on the sixth day, and the embryos will start developing then. Otherwise the chicks will fledge on different days and the adults will have trouble keeping them together.
Drat…you dont have Robins in USA. What you have are red breasted thrushes who were named as robins by european settlers as it reminded them of the cute, dainty little european robin.
I raised a robin that had fallen out of its nest. I had no idea how great of personalities they had. It took several months before he would leave home to rejoin his wild friends. I would put him out in the morning hoping he would be gone when I came home at night. He was always right there waiting for me. I still don’t know if he flew off to be wild or was eaten by a cat.
“Robin” is a name with no taxonomic significance, like warbler, flycatcher, finch, and sparrow. These names originally belonged to European species, but since have been applied to members of many different unrelated families worldwide. There are “robins” in Australia as well that are unrelated to the European Robin.
I have four hanging baskets on my front porch with artificial flowers in them. Each one has hosted a nest for several successive years. Tiny reddish birds, some kind of finch, I’m guessing. It’s such a safe place-- under the porch roof, well out of reach of any nearby trees and my two outside cats.
