It was an exciting time during the last couple days watching the young House Wrens finally leaving their nest. I tried to document as much as time allowed, hoping to catch one of the juveniles out of the nest. Read the full story:
Sunday 10:00 AM
All three young birds were still in the nest. The parents brought in food very frequently. As you can see, sometimes two insects were carried at once. I doubt that this little guy shared them with its siblings…
Sunday 1:30 PM
The parents had started calling the kids out of the box. They sat sometimes for a few minutes with food in their bill in the dead cedar tree across from the box and tried to lure them away from the nest.
Sunday 7:40 PM
At about 7:00 PM the first little wren had left the nest and flew directly into the trees of the woods. No picture was taken, it just happened too fast. The parents called the other two birds intensely but they decided to stay another night in the safety of the nest box. They received the last meal at 7:40 PM. There wasn’t enough light anymore and I used flash as my main light source, not just to fill in shadows or boost colors as usual.
Monday 9:46 AM
Early in the morning the two little House Wrens were still in the box and called for food. A quarter to ten I interrupted my work and stepped out on the porch to check out what’s going on and saw that the second bird had just left the nest box. The little guy was chirping and hopping around between our flower pots on the deck. It finally climbed up the espalier on the side of the porch where this photo was taken. Later, at about 1 PM during the eclipse of the sun, the last wren was not in the nest anymore. Here in the Durango area the sun was covered by the moon about 88.5 %. During the peak time I didn’t hear a single bird, even the hummingbirds were quiet and didn’t show up.
The wrens are still around somewhere nearby. I still heard their chatter in the woods this evening. I hope they all will make it, become mature birds, and some will return for another good summer here in Iowa. It is always a sure sign of spring when the males show up here in late April or early May and work on their reproduction again.