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Juvenile bluebirds were back this morning. I first noticed two small birds cavorting on top of the box. I thought, crap, house sparrows. I got the binoculars, the little birds were still there, and they were bluebirds! They looked rough. I guess they are losing their juvenile feathers?
They left the box and I followed them with the binoculars. Altogether there were perhaps five of them, maybe six, flying around the compost pile, dropping to the ground from the fence and returning to the fence, flying from one location on the fence to another.
I mentioned how the bluebirds pretty much disappeared after the last group fledged, and I saw juveniles one day last month. This is the first sight of them since that day last month. It is nice knowing they are still in the neighborhood.
- Ira / Coastal NW Florida
That is wonderful. I too have had the pleasure of seeing bluebirds at my birdbath and hearing them in the woods around my home and on local trails. In years past I thought they fledged, learned to hunt and then left the area. Maybe I wasn’t very observant.
WI/MI Border, about 100 miles north of Green Bay
Tim C. WI/MI border.
Yeah. They may have visited more often and I didn’t know. Too, with bluebirds, at least in my experience, they don’t linger long, so they can be easy to miss unless you sit and stare. A little like watching to catch the young fledging, look away or leave for a moment and you are likely to miss it.
I wish I knew the facts about how far the young typically travel from the nest site to find their own territory and nest site. Something for me to look up.
- Ira / Coastal NW Florida
I observed the juveniles again this morning, and also two adults.
Same as yesterday, I first noticed two juveniles on top of the nest box. I then noticed others on the fence. They flew off when I went outside to fill the birdbath and put out food (dried mealworms, dried BSF larva, suet nuggets).
After I came back in, I saw one adult on the fence. It dropped to the ground after some morsel and then flew up to one of the arms on the feeder pole and was joined by another adult. The darned things, food in feeders right below them, they again went down to the ground after more prey. I guess I can’t blame them, sort of like a choice between steak and corn flakes. I would choose the steak, too.
I’m curious now. Are they here for the rest of the fall and then winter? Or is this only a short visit and then they disappear again for a while?
- Ira / Coastal NW Florida
The juveniles came back later in the morning. I’m not sure what to make of their behavior.
Again, there were two on the next box at first and two or three elsewhere moving around on the fence and sometimes on the arms of the feeder pole. Then one would fly to the next box and hover around like it was trying to land on the box, but then, apparently, give up and fly back to perch on the fence or the feeder pole. This was repeated multiple times but the bird would never land on the box. From what I cold see, the two that were on the box were not trying to repel the third and I didn’t notice any aggressive behanvior, but who could tell for sure. Maybe the bird that was trying to join the other two on the box didn’t see room to land.
Anyway, they tried a number of times from different angles and sides of the box. On one of these attempts the bird was at the front of the box and I thought it was going to go in the box, but it never touched the box.
- Ira / Coastal NW Florida
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