What kind of wild birds are nesting in your garden?

[applestar]

Aside from occupied birdhouses, I have two wild nests in my garden this year so far. One is definitely a robin's. Robins are such familiar sight -- maybe not so wild?

This bird was having a fit flying around squawking and scolding me from afar. I tried to tell it several times already that building a nest on the blackberry arched gate trellis on the latch side of the gate was a bad idea. It was bad enough last year when they built a nest in the cherry tree on the hinge side.



The second nest is higher up and on the hinge side in the trumpet honeysuckle arched gate trellis. It looks like same/similar construction so maybe this one is a robin's, too, although a song sparrow often sigs from the top of that trellis.

[HoneyBerry]

I haven't seen any this year. I had a couple of junco nests in my yard about 5 years ago. Right there on the ground, in the long grass. They seemed so vulnerable. I have a picture of one of the nests somewhere.
I had a robin's nest once. That was a while ago. I had a cat at the time. I didn't like it, but he sometimes would drag in a bird. Just doing what cat's do. So I felt like I needed to protect the robin's nest. I picked up my cat and looked him straight in the eyes and firmly said "You had better leave those robins alone, or you've had it."
Well, the next day I came home from work and there were about 30 dead finches in the utility room. There was a cat door from the back yard into that room. The room was plastered with feathers and dead birds. It was as if he had went into a frenzy. "How dare she talk to me like that. I'll show her." He didn't touch the robins, just the finches. He had never killed that many birds before. It was really spooky.

[imafan26]

Well, the birds don't nest in my trees, they pop out the birdnest holes for the attic and nest in walls and the attic. It is a problem getting them and their nesting material out. I saw a java rice bird poking her head out. The birds in my yard are not really migratory. I have the great northern cardinal,red crested cardinal, bulbul, mejiro (white eye), society finches, Java rice bird, and the cattle egret comes by after I cut the grass. These are mostly fruit eaters. They like papaya, tomato, tangerines, figs. I have to get to them before they do. Cardinals, spotted neck doves, pigeons, small gray dove will eat the seeds from my pots if I don't cover them. There are mynahs occasionally, but not usually in my yard. My grass does not have a lot of army worms for them to eat.

Native birds have evolved to prefer special plants and live mosty in conservation areas, where there are still stands of native ohia trees.

I do have a lot of anoles, some geckos, and skinks. There are probably still some mice, although I haven't seen one lately. Yesterday, I saw a butterfly in the back yard. Which means I have to cut the butterfly bush again because it is blooming. I have a resident black hawkmoth living in my garage. It doesn't want to leave.

At the farm a couple of miles away, the golden plover comes by every winter and returns to Alaska in the Spring. They like to eat and nest in the lettuce.

[john gault]

I'm not sure if the birds are nesting, but my garden is definitely thick enough for them to nest, but they do spend a lot of time in there; however, it's very difficult to get a picture (and I've been trying), because they are small and never sit in one place long -- always going from one spot to the next -- and of course the thickness only adds to the difficulty. I've been trying to get a picture of a small bird with a lot of yellow; I would really like to ID it.

I did get this pic yesterday of a little bird eating seeds from my spiderwort patch, it was a rare occasion where the bird stayed still and was out in the open.

[LIcenter]

Haemorhous mexicanus = House Finch
https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/House_Finch/id

[applestar]

I have a birdhouse that is occupied by House Wrens almost every year. Its opening had been gnawed larger by squirrels one year, so I bought a sunburst pattern metal opening re-inforcement. The house used to have opening big enough for house sparrows and they used to bully their way into the house, then get raided by cowbirds. It was too pathetic. So the sunburst metal opening is smaller.

When the Wrens started singing, I assumed one would move in and decorate it for a female, but just now, I saw a Black Capped Chickadee with a pale green caterpillar in its beaks fly to the opening

[imafan26]

I have to add a correction to my earlier post. I found a bird nest (empty) in my kaffir lime tree. I just don't know what made it. I can tell that they took apart the coco liners from my basket and the spanish moss to build it though.

[applestar]

Haha they are ingenious aren't they? At least this one knew good nesting material when it saw it. One year, I saw what looked like trash sticking out of one of the birdhouses. I knew it had been taken over by house sparrows and wasn't happy about it, but was going to let it go... but when the trash continued to be stuffed in the birdhouse, and became plastic grocery bags, I finally decided there was no way. If they laid eggs in that mess, the chicks weren't going to make it.

Luckily, it was an easy to clean birdhouse with latched hinged side panel. When I pulled out all the junk that had been stuffed in there, I found not only plastic grocery bags but lengths of audio cassette tape, plastic candy and tasty cake wrappers.... so many that I had to simply toss them on the ground to clean it all out and by the time I was done, the area under the tree was scattered with trash that I had to pick up -- they had been compressed into the bluebird sized house and filled a plastic grocery bag. I have no idea what that bird (birds? A couple?) had been thinking.

[applestar]

I had a gazebo-style birdfeeder with a clear central feeder column that held the seeds. But it was always under attack by the squirrels, and a couple of years ago, it was dashed to the ground once too often and the hopper column broke. I had left it sittin over a bucket in the corner of the patio, and somehow, it eventually slid and tipped over.

Recently I have been noticing rusting and fluttering sounds from that direction, and eventually ID’d Carolina wren from behavior and size.

Well, it turns out that it wasn’t just hanging around among the clutter looking for spiders — I was hearing the familiar thin cheeping sounds of chicks begging to be fed, and began to wonder if there was possibly a nest in the old bird feeder — today, I obtained proof.

[Vanisle_BC]

We have lots of Juncos & Towhees in the garden. The Juncos seem to have a housing development at ground level under a big over-grown Rhodo beside the patio. Interestingly, one year a pair nested and raised chicks in the garden soil, under a withered rhubarb leaf. Not sure where the Towhees hang their hat but it can't be far away. Then there are robins in a tree at the edge of the property. A crow thought he'd investigate that but there was much screaming and he was last seen fleeing down the road with a squadron of robins in hot pursuit. I don't think anything else nests with us but there are lots of other birds around. I see eagles and hear their young nearby but haven't spotted a nest.

[applestar]

Here, juncos are the “snow birds” and arrive just as the robins (and grackles and blackbirds) leave for the winter, and leave presumably to fly north to their summer nesting grounds as the robins, et al. come back to signify arrival of spring. I tend to leave all the weedy perilla/shiso etc. seed heads standing through the winter, along with other typical seed-bearing sunflowers, etc. through the winter in the snow since I see the juncos tearing them apart, while the sunflowers are favored by chickadees and other nut-loving birds.

I used to see towhees in my garden (though I suppose Eastern Towhee and not the same as yours) but haven’t in a long time. I wonder why?

[rainbowgardener]

We have a pair of Carolina wrens that we keep seeing near our deck. Haven't figured out where the nest is. There are bluebirds nesting in our next door neighbor's bird house.

Otherwise we see mockingbirds a lot. We have had hummingbirds at our feeders for a few weeks.

[applestar]

My big bundle of bamboo is STILL on the front porch — too big and unwieldy/heavy to carry on my own, only available space wit roof overhead (no room in garage or shed), etc. etc.

Today after mowing the front lawn — and presumably having stared at it as he trundled by several times — DH told me there are bees nesting in the bamboo bundle. Fearing the worst, I approached it thinking I need to at least knock the bundle down on the ground to discourage the bees... but it turned out that the “bees” were mason bees — apparently they found a GIGANTIC version of bundled bamboo/tubing “mason bee house” on my front porch (hahaha LMAO )

And MORE IMPORTANTLY, I noted that DH had moved the bundle to a more out of the way side wall, and in the process, nearly knocked a robins nest off of the top of it. NONE of us had noticed the robin nesting in the bundle — complete shock. When I saw it, the nest was at a 45° angle and the 2 blue eggs were resting on the mud contoured rim.

I straightened it out and used three rusty ground staples which were the only things I could reach to stabilize the nest. Hopefully the momma-Robin will come back.



...I’ve thought so before, but robin’s nest is absolutely amazing in craftsmanship. Being under the porch roof and out of the weather, this nest was practically perfect. One of the reasons it didn’t fall off was because the frayed burlap strands had been woven into the nest.

When I went inside and told him, he said he never noticed the nest. He was only concerned by the bees buzzing around his head while he was sitting on the porch chair taking a break....

[applestar]

This little one was at the bird feeder-turned-birdhouse entrance yesterday. There was a flurry of parental calling, and eventually the whole family was hopping around in the plum tree branches.