Kathy , I cant wait to see the updates. Thanks for sharing.
Jill

Great photos Kathy...I have 4 Bluebird houses up and have noticed activity at 3 of them so far. The 4th is farther away from the garden so I don't see it as often. Maybe I'll have babies before long too. :)
Thanks for sharing yours.
Jan

Awww... babies! Last year I got to see cardinal babies in my tree. Makes me want to put up bird houses...

Blue Eggs for Blue Birds.... How cute!!! Mama bird is awful protective!! Not even you big ol' human can make her move! :o)

Great pictures... thank for sharing!!!

Great pictures. I love those little birds.

I'm putting up more bird houses. I need all the birds I can handle to eat the grass hoppers and unwanted other bug's.

How wonderful! Looking forward to their progress.

Kathy, those are some beautiful shots. We don't see many bluebirds on our property, but last year we had our first groups of orioles and goldfinches. I think it's time to fill up the feeders.

Keep us posted!

Glad y'all enjoyed the pics! It was rainy and cool here today. I was a little worried about the quints. But I'm happy to report that I saw all 5 chicks today. They looked dry and warm. They are going to keep their parents very busy for the next couple of weeks - with five hungry mouths to feed.
Kathy

Awesome pictures Kathy. Good luck and give them my address. Tell them to stop by on their way south! ;0)
Ed

Awesome pics...I have around 25 or so mating pairs of bluebirds...most stay here in Ky on our farm year round..I am told that they usually migrate south but forwharever reson they choose to stay all winter..We do take good care of them and have many nestboxes for them..They seem to love the atmosphere around a farm...barns,trees and fencepost overlooking grassy fields,power lines zig zagging and losts of water from watering our flowers all year...I really enjoy them..Last season during the drought/heatwave, my wife and me were watering in our potted area and a few puddles formed and the bluebirds were absolutely going nuts taking a good bath and drinking..it was funny to watch also as the sprinkler occilated back and forth they would march along back and forth with it...I know at one time we have over 50..yes 50 bluebirds in the water splashing about..Probably 75% of them were males which shows me that they are willing to set aside their territorial differences to survive..I just wish I would have had my video camera that day...we have one now and I plan on taking lots of videos for years to come of them..Talk about a priceless experience....Anyway I was check boxes theother day and most are with nests and many have 4-5 eggs and one even had 6...6 is the most I have seen in one nest so far...Be sure and post more pics as they grow if you can..Love em..Thanks, David.

Very cool. I bookmarked your page so I can keep updates. I love bluebirds! :)

That's wonderful! We have feeders out, but no houses. Your pictures are great, and it's so nice to see healthy baby birds for the spring.

Laurel

Thanks for all the nice comments! Bluebirds are my favorite. I don't know if they migrate...we have bluebirds here year round. I do my best to attact them with a birdbath, birdhouses, blueberry bushes, etc. I feel very lucky when they decide to nest here. I watched the parents feed their young today. It seems like they are bringing food every 20 minutes. Here is a pic of the male bluebird I took today. Note the grub in his beak (yum)...He brought it to his babies as soon as I backed away.
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Kathy

That's a nice photo Kathy. Love the rose. :) Have you ever tried offering a dish of meal worms to the bluebirds? I've heard that they will feed them to the babies too. I think You can purchase the meal worms at pet stores.
I'm going to try that this year if we get babies again.
Jan

Jan, All of my roses have started to bloom...thanks to the rain we've had this weekend. I've never bought mealworms. We don't have a pet store close by and it's too late to try to order them online, so I doubt I'll try it for this brood. We have several bait shops, but I've never seen mealworms in there...just wigglers and crickets. If you try them this year, be sure to let me know if you think it's worth it.
Kathy

Gosh, those are beautiful birds. I have never seen a Bluebird before,we don't get them over here in Britain--certainly not in the North anyway.
Please keep the pictures coming, it helps me from being depressed about our rubbish weather and lack of activity on the daylily front. But at least the Columbines have some flower buds on--and my little variegated periwinkles (Vinca Minor Variegata Ralph Schugart) are flowering their heads off.

Nikki

Nikki

I have fed mealworms to my bluebirds occassionally -- not just when they have a brood. I don't want to make them dependant -- but they sure did appreciate them in the drought we had last year.. insects were harder to find.
Shelly

The pics are so cool! Thanks for sharing. I'm looking forward to updated photos. I hope you are home when they start to fly. I was home one time when the chickadee babies came out of my birdhouse. They hung around all day mostly hiding in a large climbing rose and I got to take pics. Unfortunately this was before my digital camera.
Remy

Hi Newbie Here! :0) How fabulous! That must be really neat to experiance. Your pictures turned beatiful and the roses are gorgous!

~Kim

How wonderful. The only bluebird we have ever seen here was laying dead in the street. Don't know how it died. West Nile? But so nice to see them thriving elsewhere. I hope you can post another picture or two if you get the babies flapping their wings or some such.

Kathy those pictures are great. I'm sorry but I couldn't help but notice that the nest box is mounted on a fence. In order to protect the blues it needs to be mounted differently. I only tell you this because I lost a family of blues a couple years ago to a black snake that was mounted on a fence. Snakes can easily crawl into the nest box. Check out this website, www.sialis.org. It's loaded with tons of information on bluebirds. I hope those little ones fledge safely. Then maybe you can change your set-up. The female will have two or three more broods. Good luck! There is also a bluebird forum you might be interested in.

Glad everyone is enjoying the pics. The nestlings seem to be doing well. While checking them today, the male bluebird swooped me several times. It surprised me because he has been very friendly towards me so far. But I know he is just being protective.

newblue - thanks for the link (great site) and the tip about the nestbox. Maybe we can move it and figure out something different after this group has left.

Kathy

Hi Kathy,
I've got babies too!! :) No pictures of the younguns but here's a couple of Mom and Pop feeding them.
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Have yours fledged yet?
Jan

Hi All! Gorgeous pics of the babies!! Here is one of my baby Doves-all my dovies bring their babies. I have Goldfinches too! Will post more...

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Chris in CA

Hi Jan, Great pics! Did you take these with your new camera? What kind is it? I wish mine had a stonger zoom lens. My bb babies are still in the nest. Yesterday was the last day I could safely check them. I don't want them to fledge prematurely. I hope I can get another pic of them out of the nest.

Chris, Pretty pic! We have lots of doves, but I don't think they nest here (none that I've found). I love to listen to them coo.

Kathy

Yes, Kathy, I used my new camera. It's a Fuji Finepix S700 with a 10X optical zoom and an additional 4.8 digital zoom for a total of 48X total zoom capabilities. I love it for shooting closeups of birds and other shy creatures. I'm still learning how to use all of it's features however, and hope to get much better with it as I learn.
Besides the bluebird babies, I've got brown headed nuthatch babies in 2 houses and a 2 carolina wren nests that I have found so far. I always have lots of birds nesting around here. I hope you can get some pics of your babies when they fledge.
Chris...love your photo of the dove and that iris is gorgeous too. We do have doves that nest around our place. I love to watch them wade in the edge of my pond to bathe.
Jan
Jan

Hi Jan! Im envious-we'd love to have room for a pond (just .16 acre). Oh, the doves are my favorites-we used to breed them. I'm going to try to get shots of the goldfinches who are just delicious. The iris is "sycopation".

Isn't this fun! We're all feeling the Spring..........

Chris in CA

Lovely photos. I'm so glad high-speed just became available here so I can actually see them!

We don't get bluebirds here that I know of. Last year I had strawberry finches nest in one of my hanging planters. I had to water the plants very carefully for several weeks until their brood fledged.

Kathy,
I just went back and checked your photos. You made a great pictorial of the babies! At the end you stated that is was the cut off date to check the box. Is that because the babies might try to leave without mom and dad? And did you get any photos of them outside the box?
I really enjoyed the photos,
Remy

Hi Remy, Glad you liked the pics. We have really enjoyed this bluebird family. I hope they will hang around for a long time. From what I've read, you shouldn't check the nest after day 13 because it might cause the chicks to leave the nest too soon. They may flutter out of the nestbox, but be unable to fly well enough to escape predators. All of the chicks left my nestbox sometime between the morning of day 17 and the morning of day 18. I did not see them leave, but have seen them in the trees in my yard. The parents are still feeding them and the chicks make quite a racket when one of the parents brings food. They fly from limb to limb each one competing for the most attention/food. I haven't been able to get a good photo of them because they are staying high in the tree limbs and my camera doesn't have a good zoom lens. But I will keep trying. From what I can tell, there are 4 females and 1 male. They look fat and healthy, but their tale feathers are still short compared to the parents. They are so much fun to watch!
Kathy

Oh, if you can get photos of the fledglings in the trees, please do so! I'm getting empty nest syndrome, visiting your site every day to check and see if there's new photos of the babies :( lol.

LOL!
sunset shepherdess - I will do my best. But I'll bet the parents are wishing the whole brood would fly far, far away. Mom and Pop are looking kind of thin and I know they are worn out.
:-)
Kathy

remy and sunset_shepherdess - this one is for you two. It was the best I could do. The fledglings are very skittish and if I get very close, they fly away. Hope this helps with the "empty nest syndrome".
:-)
Kathy

Bluebird Fledgling - they are flying well, but are still being fed by the parents.
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Hi Kathy,
Great pic! I know how hard it is too get a clear shot. My chickadee babies were out today. At first I didn't realize it though I did think the Chickadees were being awful noisy, lol. It hit me when I had the babies very close to me in one of my big roses, and I didn't have my camera handy of course. Once I got it, I took quite a few pics, but only got a few where you can actually see them.
Remy

Here is a link that might be useful: Chickadees

Hi Remy, I enjoyed your pics of the little chickadee's. They were my grandmother's favorite bird. We used to watch them come to her bird feeder and she'd always say, "Here comes the cock of the walk"...because the chickadee was so bossy and fearless at the feeder.
Kathy

This is so cool! Where do you live? I don't have any bird feeders or bird houses, but I have a plentitude of plants, flowers and a good sized garden that attracts them. I think it is time I get started on a new project. I live in Idaho, any suggestions on what kind of house or feeder will atract birds in my area? I have tried a house before, but never got any birds in it. Are you supposed to put bedding in them or food or do they make their own beds?

keeping.idaho.green - I am in Northwest Florida. Different birds like different types of houses. Bluebirds build their own nests, but only in a cavity (like inside a nestbox - they don't build nests in tree branches, etc.). You don't put anything in the nestbox. The one I bought said that it was specifically built for bluebirds on the package. I'm not familiar with the types of birds you have in Idaho. You will have to research that. But if you're interested in Bluebirds, I will provide a link below that will tell you everything you need to know. This has certainly been a great learning experience for me and I'd highly recommend it to anyone.
Kathy

Here is a link that might be useful: Bluebird Basics

I had a couple of odd experiences last year. I was at a friends house and there was a baby robin hopping around in the yard. We watched from a distance for over an hour without seeing any signs of the parents. The baby had feathers but was not yet to fledgling stage.
I have raised baby birds before so I brought this one home with me. I feed them human baby food, beef flavor watered down just a tiny bit. I feed them with a syringe with the needle removed.
Anyway...after a few days in a bird cage inside I hung the cage outside. I noticed after a bit that there was an adult robin that was coming closer to the cage in curiosity. I set the cage on the ground a bit closer to where the adult robin was and went back a distance. To my surprise the adult robin came up to the cage and started trying to feed the baby thru the bars. I went back out and set the baby out on the ground where I could see him but where the adult could get to him. The adult immediately began to care for the baby, feeding him and calling to him to move into the brush.
This was amazing to me and I thought it was an aberration but was thrilled.
About a week later I was at another friends when the kids brought out a box. It held four baby redbirds, very small, barely had feathers. They had been on a job site 20 miles away and had seen the babies. Unfortunately they didnt realize the parents were probably very close. They assumed they had been abandoned and brought them home. I knew they didnt know how to care for them so I brought these home to. I followed the same procedure as with the robin until they were old enough to be out of a nest. Again I placed them in a cage outside for a bit. To utter amazement an adult redbird did the same thing as the adult robin. This time tho there were 4 babies, not just one. I was hesitant about letting them out but when both a male and a female started showing interest I decided to let them out to see what happened. I placed them in the lower branches of a cedar tree and watched. The pair of adults immediately started feeding and caring for them and several days later I realized that they had moved from the original tree and were beginning to fly.
Since the babies came from 20 miles away I knew there was no chance that the babies could belong to this breeding pair of adults and was happily surprised to see that not once but twice I witnessed adult birds adopt babies from another nest.
Sheila

Sheila, That is a remarkable story! Thanks for sharing it. I found a baby bluejay in our backyard one year. He had feathers, but couldn't fly yet. He could flutter for 4 or 5 feet, but he couldn't get high enough in the air to land on a branch. I called our local humane society and asked for advice. They said that this was normal for bluejays and to leave the bird alone. I was worried about predators and kept an eye on him for several days. The parents were feeding him and eventually the bird disappeared. I hope that it was because he learned to fly...but we do have cats and several hawks in our neighborhood. The hawks will circle our yard and know that it is a good place to hunt (because of the birdbath, feeders, etc. that draw birds.) You would not believe the racket all the birds make when a hawk swoops into my yard to make a kill. They are incredible creatures with a wing span of about 4 feet. They will even attack small dogs. But usually, in our yard, the victim is a mourning dove. Oh well, the hawks have to eat too and they have babies to feed as well. Last year they had a nest about 2 blocks from our house in a vacant lot. I even saw one of the hawks land on the nest and could hear the chicks begging for food. But they were way up high in a pine tree...too high for any pics from my camera. I keep hoping one will land in my yard when I have my camera out, but so far, no luck.
Kathy