Birds, Birds, Everywhere

The baby robins have fledged. They sure grew quickly!

This was taken June 4th. Little more birdlike and less fuzzy than the first pink things that came out of the eggs...

And June 7th. What a difference a few days makes!

And finally June 13th, the evening before they all fledged and spread out. Way to go, Momma Robin!

We have babies!

The robin eggs have hatched. Weirdly, I only found one little tiny piece of shell under the bush, even though I'm sure I peeked in the nest very very shortly after the hatching. My guess is that momma robin either ate the shells or disposed of them elsewhere to disguise the location of the nest. (On eating shells...my chickens get eggshells and oyster shells as a calcium supplement, as the act of making eggs draws a lot of calcium out of their systems.)

So these are the eggs, last Thursday. Note that Momma Robin is apparently in to recycling, as she's used part of a plastic bag in the nest design:

And these are the weird little balls of pink-and-fluff that resulted. Taken today:

I always wait until Momma Robin is off getting food or doing whatever, but she's never far away and she always scolds me and comes to see what I'm doing. I don't even move the branch, I just hold my camera up above it and shoot until I get the right angle to see in the nest. Should be fun to see them progress over the next few days and weeks!

And here's Momma Robin, sitting on the nest. She's hard to see, and that's how she likes it!

We also have a second family of Old World Sparrows nesting in the front birdhouse, but they've built their nest so well I can't see the babies through the front door! I'll try to snap a picture when they get big enough to gape out the door at mom and dad returning with food!