Comments on: Three bluebird eggs already!

By: Dave Heiser

Dave Heiser — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 21:00:19 +0000

Cynthia, yes three nestings during the spring and summer seasons is common for bluebirds. They can even go as late as August depending on where you live. Glad you are enjoying them!

By: Cynthia

Cynthia — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 16:00:08 +0000

I don’t know much about blue birds other than that they are beautiful. We inherited a blue bird house that the last owners had. After noticing a 3rd round of babies, I became curious. Is that normal. It’s July 24th and seems an unlikely time for raising babies.

By: Dave Heiser

Dave Heiser — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 18:03:24 +0000

Alice, they may have done just that! Possibly they pecked it apart and removed it that way…

You definitely could get another nesting this year. We have our female sitting on four eggs right now. This is our third go round! :-)

By: Alice Mercer

Alice Mercer — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 16:48:12 +0000

Dave,
The cowbird egg disappeared from the nest about 10 days after I wrote you on June 16. The eggs hatched and the babies have now fledged. When I cleaned out the box, I found no evidence of the egg having been buried. Maybe my smart bluebirds teamed together and got it out of the nest. How in the world could they do that??
Is it possible that we may have a third nesting in this box this year?
Thanks for all your observations and information!
Alice

By: Dotty

Dotty — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 11:13:05 +0000

I am so excited! I went outside at 6:30am to give our bluebirds some meal worms. There are 4 eggs in the box. I had my mirrow and to my AMAZEMENT, I watched one of the little eggs hatch. What a thrill.
Thanks for site. I’ll be back.
Dotty

By: Dave Heiser

Dave Heiser — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 15:57:23 +0000

Lisa, hi! We have had eggs that didn’t hatch before also. At this point they won’t, so it’s advisable to quickly reach in and carefully get them out. Otherwise, if one breaks, you can quickly get problems with ants. Hard to say what caused them to fail, but here’s a link with some possibilities… Thanks for asking!

http://sialis.org/eggsunhatched.htm

By: Lisa

Lisa — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 00:00:04 +0000

Dave,
Just found your blog tonight and have enjoyed reading the posts. My husband and I are new at being bluebird grandparents and I can’t seem to find an answer to one question that is bugging me. On June 6th we discovered we had 4 eggs in the nesting box. We didn’t check again until June 11th and found two baby birds! We are so excited! We checked again on June 13th and 15th and still just the two babies. What I’m wondering is….why haven’t the other two eggs hatched? We’ve been taking pictures each time we check. We plan to put up at least one more nesting box in our yard and hope to have other bluebirds come visit. We also enjoy watching all the other backyard birds that come visit our feeders. My husband is a woodworker and has been building bluebird nesting boxes and bird feeders for some relatives and friends who also enjoy bird watching. Thanks for any info you have to offer. Lisa

By: Dave Heiser

Dave Heiser — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 15:34:53 +0000

Liz in Ky, very sorry to hear this…sounds like it may have been a house wren. Here’s a link with info on what they can do and on discouraging them.

http://sialis.org/wrens.htm

If you think it might have been something else, check this page with more ideas…

http://sialis.org/predatorid.htm

By: Liz in Ky

Liz in Ky — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 23:25:33 +0000

Dave,
We had 5 eggs on June 7. Checked the house today and the nest is half gone and no birds around. What could have happened? We enjoyed them so much and now they are gone.

By: Dave Heiser

Dave Heiser — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 16:33:56 +0000

Alice, cowbirds will often lay eggs in other nests, so maybe this will solve your mystery (if your spotted egg looks like the one in this picture). Check it out, and please let me know!

http://sialis.org/cowbirds.htm

Here’s another page for different egg identification:

http://sialis.org/nests.htm

If it is a cowbird egg, it is protected by law and unlawful to remove. Learn more here:

http://sialis.org/mbta.htm