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Nesting Robins

Jonathan — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 02:07:18 +0000

We were out enjoying the memorial day sun today and got watching a robin collecting food for her nesting chicks. She was going back and forth between our lawn and her nest under our deck with plenty of treats for her little chicks. I shot some video of the robin on our lower deck and then used a ladder to get a little closer to the nest.

The American Robin is not as cute as it’s European counterpart and is actually a member of the thrush family. The two types of robin are not closely related.

BirdCam – A Sad Ending

Jonathan — Tue, 27 May 2008 22:41:00 +0000

Heavy rain on Monday saw the BirdCam go offline for the day but today it was back in full working order. Unfortunately when the camera came back online, the pictures were less than pleasing. There is only one baby blue tit visible in the nest and regretfully it’s dead. The last few days the number of blue tits fell from the initial 10 to just 5 on Sunday.

Unfortunately the Bank Holiday weather caused the camera to fail at just the wrong moment so it is unlikely that we will know what happened. However, we had noticed that the birds were not growing as fast as expected so we are assuming the adult parents may have had trouble competing with other birds for food.

Summary

Eggs: 11
Hatched: 10
Survived: 0

BirdCam – May 20th

Jonathan — Tue, 20 May 2008 10:46:16 +0000

After just over two weeks of incubating, the first baby blue tits have hatched!

The following clip shows the hatchlings (now just a few hours old!) being fed caterpillers by both the female and male adult. The adults chirp when they arrives with the food to get the attention of the baby birds.

There were 11 eggs in total and 6 or 7 have hatched today.

BirdCam – May 5th

Jonathan — Mon, 05 May 2008 21:07:35 +0000

The bird left the nest for a while this afternoon allowing us to count 9 eggs!

In this clip the female bird incubates the eggs while the male feeds her. At the end of the clip they both leave the nest and leave the eggs on display for the camera!

BirdCam – May 4th

Jonathan — Sun, 04 May 2008 22:06:38 +0000

Eggs!

We first spotted them on May 1st (last Thursday) but counted at least 6 eggs on Saturday (May 3rd). The Blue Tit has been closely guarding them from the prying eyes of our camera so it’s been quite difficult to count exactly how many there are. Also, prior to leaving the nest each time it covers up the eggs with it’s nesting!

The following clip was recorded earlier today and gives you a sneak peek (don’t blink) at the new eggs.

BirdCam – April 25th

Jonathan — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 22:35:10 +0000

The blue tit decides to spend a night in the box. It has not been around much in the last few days so fingers crossed it will stick around a bit!

This is quite a short clip as it’s only really sleeping, although you do see it fidget a little and tuck it’s head under it’s wing for a little shut eye!

Apologies for the poor sound quality in the first half of this video.

BirdCam – April 20th

Jonathan — Sun, 20 Apr 2008 19:47:55 +0000

Our blue tit was hard at work this morning doing some serious nest building. For the first time it looked like the bird was creating the hole in the nest in prepation for the eggs. You can see it doing this by burrowing its head and shifting around in the bottom right corner of the picture.

In the afternoon I setup my DV camera to capture some video of the front of the box. After about 3 hours of on and off waiting, the bird reappeared and gave me some great shots!

BirdCam – April 14th

Jonathan — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 22:45:26 +0000

This will hopefully be the first of a series of videos captured from the Blue Tit nesting box in our back garden.

The box is fitted with a wireless camera which transmits the pictures to a receiver indoors connected to my laptop using the KWorld USB2800D video capture device. I then edit the final video in Adobe Premiere and upload to Viddler ready for hosting.

The Blue Tit has been making it’s nest for a few weeks now but has not spent many nights inside the box, presumably in favour of searching for a suitable mate! This time last year a blue tit had completed it’s nest and was sleeping full time in the box, so we are hoping this little fellow will start to settle down quite soon!

I will continue to post more “BirdCam” videos throughout the spring.