A Western Bluebird Season in Flagstaff, Arizona

Joy, Sorrow & Mystery

By Harold & Paula Ables

JOY

Having a family of Western Bluebirds (Sialia Mexicana) in your backyard makes for an exciting season, and that’s how our season began in the spring of 2007. 

A pair of Western Bluebirds returned for the second year to a nest box in our backyard on the southwest edge of Flagstaff, Arizona, at an elevation of 7,000 feet.  The female inspected the nest box while the male checked out the bird bath.

The couple immediately set up housekeeping with mom tending the eggs and dad delivering tasty snacks – caterpillars, grasshoppers, moths, butterflies and assorted other delicacies.

While the female was incubating the eggs, we uncovered some earthworms in our iris garden and decided to offer a little feeding assistance by draping an earthworm over the entrance to the nest box.  The earthworm just sat there for a few seconds, then jiggled momentarily and rapidly disappeared into the nest box.  We thought we were doing a good deed and tried this a second time a few hours later.  The results were quite different this time.  As soon as we moved away from the nest box, the male flew down, snatched the earthworm and literally slung it over a nearby fence.  We didn’t try that anymore and have since learned that earthworms are not good for Western Bluebirds and may cause severe diarrhea in the parent bird.  The male clearly knew his business!

Occasionally, the female would leave the nest and this afforded us the opportunity to lift the side of the box and inspect the nest. We did this the second week of May and found four beautiful blue eggs in a somewhat disheveled nest.

The wood shavings at the bottom were put in by us as a starter.

By the end of May both parents were very busy delivering food to the chicks and, during one of the feeding intervals, we discovered that only three of the eggs had hatched.  Three very hungry chicks with very large mouths greeted our opening the side of the nest box.

The meals on wings activity by both parents was intense during the daylight hours for the next 17 or 18 days.

Surprisingly, the parents paid no attention to the roasted caterpillars we purchased for them.  They only began eating them, and then only sparingly, after the chicks had fledged.

The parents, especially the male, guarded the nest box from a nearby Arizona Ash tree.

Woe betide any other critter, from Pygmy Nuthatch to Northern Flicker and especially Ebert Squirrel, if it approached the vicinity of the nest box.  The poor Ebert Squirrels probably needed psychological counseling by the end of the summer.  The parents would frequently chase them all the way up one tall Ponderosa pine tree and down another, pecking at them all the way.  Even when the squirrels learned to avoid the nest box, they were still harassed unmercifully at times.

Occasionally, we observed a parent departing the nest box with something in its beak.  We managed to image one such departure and, as the image below shows, the female was nest cleaning - removing fecal material. Yuck!

By the end of the second week of June, the three chicks were overflowing the nest and beginning to show signs of wanting to leave those close quarters.  Early in the morning of June 13 at about 6:30, we observed the male parent apparently encouraging, what turned out to be, the last chick to leave the nest.

A few moments later the chick ventured a little farther out of the nest box and shortly after the following image was taken, it flew with a great deal of confidence to the limb of a nearby pine tree.

After waiting several minutes without seeing any activity at the nest box, we checked the nest and found it empty except for the infertile egg.   Three of the four eggs had hatched into three, two male and one female, healthy chicks.  We removed the old nesting materials, cleaned the nest box, put in some more wood shavings and hoped the parents would start another brood.

In between begging the parents for food, the three chicks began exploring the backyard.  The next image shows one of the male chicks on top of a platform feeder.  The parents continued to feed them for several days but by June 20 the female was starting to incubate eggs for another brood.  Dad then had the sole responsibility for feeding the chicks and for feeding mom on the nest.

Although the young birds could clearly feed themselves by the last week of June, they missed no opportunity to beg dad for food.  He was a busy guy feeding the chicks, feeding his mate and guarding the nest box.

The young birds quickly learned to eat suet and the bird bath was a favorite attraction.

Bathing was obviously a favorite pastime.  First, you test the bath water with a foot

then you dive in.

Splashing around is great fun

and is sometime a spectator sport.

The Western Bluebird chicks were joined in our backyard by a few other youngsters during the summer.  There was the Steller’s Jay chick that looked like “this was not what it signed up for,”

but later seemed happier when being fed by a parent on our deck table.

Four American Robin chicks were around for a few weeks, one of which is about to be fed an insect in the next image.

A juvenile Hairy Woodpecker frequently visited the suet feeder.

A juvenile Red-shafted Northern Flicker visited our feeders with its parent.

And finally a juvenile Red-backed Junco enjoyed our seed for a few weeks.

There were four eggs again in the second nest and we were eagerly looking forward to the interaction of the two broods of chicks.  All four eggs hatched this time and we were able to photograph the newly hatched chicks on July 9.

We watched a repeat of the parents feeding the chicks and chasing intruders or, in some cases, innocent passers-by from the vicinity of the nest box.  At 10:30 am on July 26 we took a picture of the four almost fully grown chicks in the nest.

We were hoping to be able to photograph them leaving the nest, perhaps the next day.

SORROW

Unfortunately, this was not to be.  July 27 was a sad day for us and the Western Bluebird parents.  When we ventured outside at 8:00 am, fully expecting to see chicks ready to leave the nest, we found a few feathers scattered underneath the nest box and both parents in a nearby tree mournfully calling to their chicks.

Each had an insect in its beak and they kept flying to the nest box in search of the chicks.  They both continued calling and searching the yard for a couple of hours.  It was heartbreaking to see them in such anguish and we didn’t feel much better.  After a while they ate the insects they had brought for the chicks and then flew away from our yard.

MYSTERY

What happened to the four chicks is a mystery to us.  They had to have been taken sometime during the night or the very early morning hours.  There were no marks on the tree or the nest box and the nest did not appear to have been disturbed.  The only remains of the four beautiful chicks were the few feathers on the ground directly beneath the nest box.  What could have taken the chicks?  We have not seen a snake in our yard for more than 25 years and have never seen a raccoon in our neighborhood.  Occasionally, a neighbor’s cat will venture into the yard but we have never seen it harm a bird.

The parents returned infrequently during the remainder of the summer and departed for the season in early September.  The three juveniles, however, spent most of their time as our guests through October.  At the end of October, while we were raking the yard, all three flew to a tree quite close to us, watched us for several minutes and then, as if bidding us goodbye, flew away for what we assumed would be their journey south to warmer climes. 

MORE JOY & ANOTHER MYSTERY

Much to our surprise, the three juvenile Western Bluebirds returned to our suet feeders in the early morning of December 22.  It was a cold morning with a temperature of 18°F during their short visit from 7:30 to 8:00 am.  They made a repeat visit the next morning about the same time.  Their bright blue feathers practically glowed in the early morning light.  The white streaks on their breasts had almost disappeared and the males had lost their white eye rings.

We did not see them again until the early mornings of January 9 & 10 when there was 18 inches of snow on the ground and the temperature hovered around 10°F.  They appeared to be healthy and each gobbled up a lot of Peanut Delight suet before departing for parts unknown.

Why they returned during the cold winter is another mystery to us.  From what we have read, the Western Bluebirds in an area get together in the early fall and migrate as a group to warmer climates south of us.  Since we have seen no other Western Bluebirds in our neighborhood, it is not clear to us that our birds had a group to migrate with.  Could it be that the parents were so distraught by the loss of their second brood that they headed south without instructing their first brood in the art of migration?  We continue to keep an eye out for the juveniles, but it is now the end of January and they have not reappeared.

Our plan for the coming spring is to install a Noel Predator Guard on the nest box.  Hopefully, this will protect the chicks until they fledge and, thereby, prevent the reoccurrence of last season’s tragedy.  Our hope is that the family will return to nest this spring and make our backyard home to multiple broods of beautiful Western Bluebird chicks throughout the 2008 season.

Addendum

The Western Bluebirds returned in the spring of 2008 and began preparing their nest in the nest box (without the Noel Predator Guard installed) in mid April.  The picture below was taken while the couple was putting the finishing touches on their nest on 19 April 2009 some 12 days before the first of 5 eggs was laid.

Shortly after the 5 chicks hatched, we installed the Noel Predator Guard on the nest box.  The parents were initially frightened by it and would not fly to the nest box with the insects for the chicks.  This fear lasted about 10 minutes and, thereafter, the parents seemed to enjoy the guard and often used it as a perch.

The Bluebirds have produced two broods of 4 or 5 chicks each for 5 years beginning in 2006.  Although there have been some losses each year, the 2007 loss of the entire brood  has not been repeated.  The Noel Predator Guard has been accepted by the parents and perhaps it has offered the protection needed for the chicks.