I monitored this nest throughout this season. Sadly, one chick out of three survived. Last year none survived. (A great horned owl is suspect.) I witnessed this chick go from baby food, small frogs and mice, to larger prey, squirrel. The expression on the juvenile’s face is priceless!
I was watching a Great Blue Heron catch fish. He caught and quickly swallowed little fish but when he caught this catfish it was more that he could handle. I watched him for a long time as he tried to swallow the fish! In the end he abandoned the fish!
This was our fourth or fifth year observing the Peregrine Falcon nest site just above the Visitors Center at the Yaquina Head Outstanding Natural Area just north of Newport, Oregon. We had been watching the parents hanging in the air over a cliff opposite the nest, looking like two kites on strings. After 30 seconds or so and some discussion between them they took off towards the south and the coastline. About five minutes later they returned, the male with a Bonaparte’s Gull. As they called back and forth the male went up in the air, waiting for the female to come under him. As soon as she got into position he transferred the Gull from his talons to his beak and waited for her to come up and grab it. She took what appeared to be two tries- on the second she secured the Gull and then quickly went ‘turbo mode’ and flew off to the nest where she began to pluck the feathers and rip off chunks of meat for their three chicks to eat. An updraft had those feathers flying straight up as if a pillow fight was going on. The male disappeared after the transfer and ‘mom’ took over all the duties of meal preparation. Amazing to witness.
This was our fourth or fifth year observing the Peregrine Falcon nest site just above the Visitors Center at the Yaquina Head Outstanding Natural Area just north of Newport, Oregon. We had been watching the parents hanging in the air over a cliff opposite the nest, looking like two kites on strings. After 30 seconds or so and some discussion between them they took off towards the south and the coastline. About five minutes later they returned, the male with a Bonaparte’s Gull. As they called back and forth the male went up in the air, waiting for the female to come under him. As soon as she got into position he transferred the Gull from his talons to his beak and waited for her to come up and grab it. She took what appeared to be two tries- on the second she secured the Gull and then quickly went ‘turbo mode’ and flew off to the nest where she began to pluck the feathers and rip off chunks of meat for their three chicks to eat. An updraft had those feathers flying straight up as if a pillow fight was going on. The male disappeared after the transfer and ‘mom’ took over all the duties of meal preparation. Amazing to witness.
These 2 baby Doves are thinking of taking their first flight into the world….
I was an eye witness to this juvenile hawk’s rescue. It fell out of it’s nest in front of my son’s apartment. He contacted a rehabilitator and she brought him a large basket. He put the basket and hawk in a tree. The parents watched and did continue feeding it. The day after this was taken he flew away.
I had the pleasure of visiting the St. Augustine rookery in mid-April of 2016 just at the peak of the Great Egret nesting. It seemed like everywhere we looked there were egret young clamoring to be fed, or adults tending youngsters. I spotted this nest back in a tree and watched while the adult preened and tended a single very small nestling. It was touching to see how very gentle the adult was when feeding the nestling and when moving about in the nest.
This mother Mallard at Steigerwald National Wildlife Refuge successfully defended her ducklings against a mink attack by swimming rapidly around the mink, quacking loudly and beating her wings against the water, thus distracting the mink and enabling her ducklings to escape. The mink retreated and the ducklings were soon reunited with their mother.
This the whole entire family all lined up as if they were posing. The key is the family is getting even larger every day. I believe mother (Abigail) is sitting on her 2nd brood of the season. P.S. Her 1st eggs (Abby & Rusty) hatched from white eggs. Absolutely adorable watching them take their 1st bath. If only the camera was at hand for that.
Female Grebe feeds chick a feather to line it’s stomach
I went to water my hanging Boston Fern and was surprised to find a House Finch nest!
Osprey observations at the nest ….today was a preening day
This photo is actually a screenshot from a video from my GoPro camera! The nest box was home to two broods so far this breeding season. The fledge from the first brood followed the adult male to the nest box. The male intended on bringing his yummy caterpillar to the female sitting on the second brood nest, but she wasn’t back on the nest yet, so the fledge sat on the top of the box and begged for the meal! Pappa Prothonotary gave the fledge the meal and flew off. The fledge then proceeded to peck around on the nest box and then flew over to the maple tree and discovered the GoPro camera! A few pecks and several curious looks later… it flew off to find more yummy things!
These bluebird siblings came with their parents to get mealworms in my back yard. On one occasion they all decided to perch on the feeder at the same time.
He couldn’t get close enough to her! (He’d inch closer, she’d inch away; he’d inch closer, she’d inch away….)
He was singing his heart out to the female perched above.
While observing the heron rookery for several weeks, I noticed the herons sitting with their wings out, they appear to be shielding the little ones from the sun. I also noticed another interesting behavior, the nests are very close together, and I watch one heron steal sticks from the herons nest above her and tuck them into her own nest.
This adult whene and gone for feeding the youngs.
I give some materails like fur of mammals for their nests.
While visiting Magnolia Gardens, Audubon Swamp Garden, I observed this Great Blue Heron getting ready to feed her chicks.
While visiting Magnolia Gardens, Audubon Swamp Garden, I observed a pair of Anhinga working on their nest. When they were finished I was fortunate to capture this beautiful moment of the loving pair.
This is the first time I’ve heard of this happening. A flighted juvenile VGSW from some other nest (not one of the nest boxes that were being monitored, none of them had fledged at this time) decided to take up residence inside this nest box which already housed 4 other VGSW chicks. The small chicks were about 14 days old at this point. He would beg from these parents (not his own) on the wing as they foraged and then race them back to the nest box and get inside just in time to turn around and stick his head out of the entrance hole and open his mouth for the bugs. I admit that I chased him off whenever I noticed him hanging out in the nest box. I was concerned he would stop the flow of food to the smaller chicks in the nest box. While I was impressed with his cunning, his deviousness was hurting the offspring of these hard-working parents, so he had to go! He hung around for about 2 days then he must have decided to put forth some effort and feed himself.
American Robing feeding a nice, big, juicy worm to it’s hungry young.
I came back from vacation to find the hummingbird feeder that hangs outside my work window on the ground. I knew the string was old so I knotted the string and re-hung the feeder. Later that day I saw something reflected in my monitor and turned around to see this…a female American Goldfinch shredding the string for nesting materials! And she could have cared less that I was watching her. By 4:30 that evening the feeder was back on the ground, so I used paperclips to hang it up again and left the string for her to do with as she pleased.
These two Glaucous-winged Gulls have started their breeding season and are mating now over the next couple of days. They are calm and friendly right now, but as soon as they are incubating their eggs and their chicks start to hatch, they will turn into highly aggressive birds. It is crucial for them to be aggressive, since Bald Eagles, Peregrine Falcons and North American River Otters will predate their nests.
While studying thick-billed murres in the Canadian Arctic, I captured this photo of a murre parent guarding its chick on the dirty cliff-edge rock where thousands of murres breed.
Morning hours were busy for the adult Peregrines Falcons as they often fed the young 3 times before the heat of the day. At this stage, the young were large enough to be safe in the nest so that the female could also help the male hunt. She had just fed them a bird, rapidly, and she is now heading out for more prey to feed the rapidly growing young falcons.
2 cardinal siblings observing the observer.
a memorable moment while photographing tree swallows on nest boxes in a local audobon sanctuary. found an egret feather was found and it was instant chaos as just about the entire colony wanted it! As soon as one would claim it and get it to a box, another would steal it. Often 2 or more birds would battle over it in mid air. The mob of sparrows managed to place this feather in at least 6 different boxes before the prize was finally claimed by one lucky pair.
This was the first time I was able to see the Tree Swallow chicks peeking out of their nest. Both Parents were spending time taking turns to feed them. Photo taken in Derry, NH 5/16
This juvenile was feeding its younger siblings! With a bug in its beak, it made several attempts at getting into the box (it seemed to have difficulty keeping its grip on the wood below the hole), while the three-day-old nestlings squeaked plaintively within. At last it got in, and emerged a moment later empty-beaked. About a week later, I saw it (or possibly another of the same brood) feeding the babies again.
These are Little Emmie’s babies from this year, I named them Jade & Juniper. Jade was fully fledged in this photo and getting ready to venture out of the nest. When I arrived the next day, she was gone and Jade was still preparing for her departure. She flew 2 days later.
The female Bluebird was busy gathering material for the nest box. The male was gathering snacks for her to keep up her energy.
This beautiful Prothonotary Warbler raised two broods in this nest box on our front porch.