The nestlings have fledged!

The nestlings have fledged!  All that's left is a squished nest and a lone egg.

Today, July 1, 2011,  I went out to the Christmas Tree  Trail  to check in on the nestlings and see if they had fledged yet.  The nestlings are 21 days old today, and I have been checking on them all week,  going out to the trail on Monday and Wednesday of this week to see how they were doing.  Western Bluebirds usually fledge from the nestbox between 19-23 days old, but I could still hear them inside the nestbox earlier this week, and Desi and Lucy were still busy going back and forth between the box and their hunting to feed the kids.  Today, though, was quite different.

When I got to the trail this afternoon, I didn't see Desi and Lucy right away like I have been.  I went up to the box, tapped on the side, but heard nothing.  As I looked up, Desi had seen me and came to greet me.  He hovered over the box, and flew from tree to tree, to see if I had brought his treat for him (I leave a few meal worms for Lucy and Desi when I come to the box, so they associate my monitoring of the box as a positive thing).  As I left the worms for Desi, Lucy came by as well, and both of them swooped down and picked up the worms.  But instead of bringing the worms to the nestbox (like they normally did), they both made a b-line straight for a large nearby tree.  When they landed inside the foliage of the tree, I could hear the familiar chirps of baby bluebirds in the trees.  The nestlings had fledged!  It either had been yesterday or today (Friday) because they were still in the box as of Wednesday.  I spoke to Phil and Fran who own the Christmas Tree farm, and they both stated that earlier that day, they had gone down to the box to leave a couple worms for the bluebirds, and that instead of taking the worms to the box, they also flew straight up to the same tree as I had witnessed.  the only difference was that they heard a small chirp in the box.  This was about 1:30pm and I had arrived around 5pm, so we are quite sure that the nestlings fledged today.

Closer view of the nest and egg

We then went ahead and opened the box to check inside and sure enough, there were no nestlings in the box, only a very squished down nest that had become quite messy in the last few days from the energetic and growing nestlings.  It was amazing to see how the big beautiful nest that Lucy had built was now a quarter of the size it once was (her nest was so sweet--she had a couple of small bird feathers neatly tucked into the sides of the nest).  But what surprised me even more, was the 6th egg that Lucy had laid and that had never hatched, was still intact and sitting on the side of the nest.  I was absolutely amazed by this!  With five energetic nestlings in the box, jumping up and down, I was sure eventually it would have broken into many small pieces and discarded by Lucy.  A very special treasure for me to find!

I was hoping that the bird camera would have caught pictures of the nestlings taking their first flight from the box, but the SD card filled up quickly from taking photos of Desi and Lucy's many trips back and forth from the field to the box with tasty insects.  I did take a photo of the 6th egg in my hand, to give you all a reference of how small bluebird eggs are.

Bluebird eggs are really tiny!

A very exciting day indeed!  We are all very happy the fledgling of the baby bluebirds was successful.  We now get watch the babies grow and learn how to hunt, as Desi will take them under his wing and show them the ropes on how to hunt for insects.  The fledglings will stay with Desi and Lucy for the remainder of the year and will help their parents out as Lucy prepares to build another nest for her second clutch of eggs for the season.