Birds, Nest, and Trees

Even though it has been snowing on and off all day, look at what is under my deck! I think spring may actually be here – I hope Old Man Winter takes the hint and goes away.

I don’t know what kind of bird this is, but it looks like we will have baby birds. I know that birds can be protective, so I hope they don’t dive bomb us while we work and play in our yard.

Last year several large birds started building nests under the deck, but we were able to remove the nests before they completed them. We don’t want the birds to pester the kids when they play outside. This year, because it has been so cold, we didn’t see this one until it was too late. My husband wanted to take it down, but I didn’t have the heart. I hope these birds will return my sappiness and leave the kids alone when they are outside. I’m quite excited; I hope I can get some pictures of the babies. It is hard to get a good angle because I have to photograph them from below.

When I was four or five years old, I was obsessed with trees and nests. I loved sitting in the canopy of a tree hidden by leaves while the gentle breeze swayed and rocked both me and the tree. Trees carry such a feeling of safety, protection, and peace. I discovered quite by accident that if I put grass into a coffee can, added water, and set it in the sun, the grass would dry hard into the shape of a nest. Because it was grass, when I added the water, it would stink to high heaven before it dried, but once it was completely dry it no longer smelled like fresh manure. When my little nest was dry, I would hold it carefully in one hand and use my other hand and elbow to climb high into a tree and tenderly place the nest in the forks of a branch.

One day, just as I was high enough to place the grass nest, I slipped. The fall seemed to happen in slow motion. The branches scratched at me at I brushed through them. I tucked the nest closer to my body to keep it safe, wondered if I would die when I hit the ground, and landed with an “oomph”. I lay dazed for several minutes. I wasn’t dead. The nest was unbroken, but my hand didn’t smell very good; I must have gripped it a little to hard on the way down, and it was still a little damp in the middle. My shoulder and arm aching, I slowly sat up and rested for a few minutes, then trembling from adrenaline and pain rose to my feet. I felt shaky, but I climbed back up that tree and placed the nest where a bird family could find it. Periodically, I climbed the trees to see if any birds had found the grass nests, but they were always empty. I wondered why they didn’t like my little nests – they looked just like the real thing.

Last year, when we pulled the partially made nests down from under our deck, I discovered that my grass nests were nothing like a real bird's nest. We gave the most finished one to my child’s kindergarten teacher. That nest had bigger pieces of vegetation on the outside, and smaller and softer pieces of vegetation on the inside. The whole nest was lined with mud throughout the layers. I didn’t know that birds knew about adobe. I can see why a nest is warm enough for the eggs to hatch yet stays cool when the weather is bad. I wish we had a video camera watching them while they built it. I would love to see how birds carry the mud. I can’t imagine that a beak would hold a lot of mud; they must have to make so many, many trips – and to think they do it all without hands.

I’ll keep you posted on our bird family.

By the way, the spring flowers are lovely - a bit snow covered, but lovely.
Bleeding hearts:

A close-up of the bleeding hearts.

Tulips ten days ago:

 

Tulips Today: