Wow ten pairs with eggs?! And I feel like I hit the lottery if I get one pair a year! Good job on your part, maybe you can help me to get more pairs to choose one of our nest boxes and have successful fledglings, which has been rather hard because of so many predators that threaten them and have killed newly hatched eggs or this years issue pulling out eggs and pecking them. Anyway, Im going to start a new thread asking for help once again from all the knowledgeable blue birders here like yourself to help me have more success in our nest boxes this year. Thank you for helping so many blues nest in your boxes, I would love to see that many blue birds in one area, accept in the winter when they are all flocked together in search of food. Good for you! Gina

Kendra the last time I heard A HOWR was a few weeks ago. Since then nothing. Plus my boxes are in a large field that have never had HOWR using them. The site is so open the chances of another natural cavity being nearby is VERY slim. Donna I can just barely see it from my house. It is in my neighbor's field. My yard is open enough but is too close to woods and would just have problems with HOWR. (Which yes, used to cause me problems) I also saw a Cooper's hawk fly right through and by the boxes today. Another suspect. I think you have it right on the money Donna. And the nest appears the same and undisturbed so I highly doubt they layed more. Again, I never actually saw a 3rd, 4th, or 5th egg. I was away on a trip. So predation is very unlikely.

Hi Mary- the only other possibility that I can think of is if something happened to one of the original mates & the remaining one found a new mate, the new mate will rarely have anything to do with the eggs/babies since they weren't their offspring. In this case, the new mate often steers the original mate away from the eggs/babies so they can try to produce their own (may not even try to produce since it's late in the nesting season). I would think it would be one of those scenarios. Research shows that it's about 10 degrees hotter in the box than it is outside. If it's in 90's, it could be too hot for them. Hatchlings can't regulate their own body temps for first 6 days. Risk would be same if too cold at beginning of season. If lawn pesticides (could be neighbor's if yard is close), babies are usually bloated. Did you notice anything unusual with them? Bloating or markings? Those are my only thoughts. Such a bummer & so sorry!

I was checking our bird houses and found one with what seem to be 4 bluebird eggs (correct me if I’m wrong), but 2 of them were placed to the side of the nest like they had been rejected. Any ideas on why this would happen? (Picture in comments)