Nesting season is winding down around here in the southeastern U.S. and I’m kind of glad because I foolishly decided to participate in the Nest Monitoring efforts conducted by Cornell University. “Foolishly” because while I knew on an intellectual level how rough it is “out there” for all critters, including birds, I never really realized the carnage that goes on every day. After monitoring several nests, I have to say, I’m amazed that there are any birds–or any critters–able to survive. It certainly isn’t a Bambi movie out there by any stretch of the imagination, and frankly, movies like that only serve to give folks the entirely wrong impression of nature. It isn’t cutsey. It can be brutal.

Anyway, the first two nests I was monitoring, an Eastern Bluebird nest and a Carolina Chickadee nest, were doing fairly well until the chicks were a few days away from fledging. Then, well, snakes got into the boxes, first one nest and then the other, and ate all the baby birds. Then I was watching a cardinal’s nest, a Yellow-billed Cuckoo’s nest, and a Summer Tanager’s nest and all of these had all their hatchlings eaten by squirrels. I was incredibly depressed, especially the cuckoos because I was looking forward to seeing baby cuckoos.

Carolina Chickadee fledgling

But, it wasn’t all bad news out there. One Carolina Chickadee nest managed to fledge five chickadees and the Eastern Bluebirds tried again in the same nest box and managed to fledge five bluebirds. A cardinal is trying again even as I type this and I think that the eggs hatched today. I can’t be sure because the nest is too high up for me to check the contents, but both parents have been peering into it today so I think something is going on. I’m going to be optimistic and say that the eggs hatched this morning.

Eastern Bluebird fledgling

Then, I managed to find several Yellow-crowned Night-heron nests in the swamp and while one was destroyed (owls? hawks? racoons?) two survived and managed to produce five Night-herons each, so that’s ten night-herons! Success! Phew!

Adult Yellow-crowned Night-heron at nest with chicks

Two of the five Yellow-crowned Night-heron chicks ready to fledge

A silly pair of Prothonotary Warblers decided to build a nest in an ornamental box we had that had been chewed up by flying squirrels, but despite that, they managed to produce four warblers that survived and fledged, so all was not lost this summer. We had some success despite the failures, and as some folks pointed out to me, snakes and squirrels have to eat, too. And the snakes eat a lot of rats around here, and I’m grateful to them for that since the rats also eat a lot of eggs/baby birds found in nests closer to the ground. I guess all that carnage balances out. In a way. In a very depressing way, but there was enough success to make me feel optimistic after all.

Although I don’t know if I’m up for monitoring nests next year. Sigh. I probably will be, though. In the end, I’m always optimistic and hopeful that the birds will have a few successes and live to fly another day!

For folks who want to make the effort (and it is quite a responsibility) to monitor, i.e. check on, bird nests every few days until the chicks fledge (or don’t), I recommend the Cornell University nest monitoring program: Nest Watch. They have educational material and an app for folks to record the progress of any nests they find. They even have plans for building bird nests. I do, however, heartily recommend that if you put up bird nesting boxes, you also put up baffles to try to keep snakes and squirrels from snacking on the eggs and chicks. Nothing is 100%, but baffles can help.

And please note: while it can be educational for young folks to get involved, it’s also important to realize that things happen. Not all nests will be successful and it can be heartbreaking. That is a learning experience, too, but it’s important to make sure the young folks aren’t “put off nature” for life if they find a snake in a nest box previously occupied by chicks. It’s part of nature. There are also things like unhatched eggs or other issues that happen, so talking about it is a good idea before getting started with what may seem like a really sweet learning experience (and who doesn’t like baby birds?). Ultimately, I think activities like this are healthy and good experiences and they get folks involved with nature–real nature, not Bambi–and that can only be good. It also educates us about the fragile hold creatures like birds have on life in this world and helps us to respect them and their need for a habitat where they can live, breed, and forage.

So, yeah. I think I will monitor nests again next year.