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Clutch of 8

18 years ago

Some of you know I conduct research on cavity nesting birds in tree cavities, not nest boxes. One of the species I study is the Western Bluebird. This year I had a nest with 8 eggs and upon last check, all 8 eggs have hatched. Guess Mom and Dad will have their beaks full trying to feed all those babies.

This is the first nest out of approximately 130 WEBL nests I have monitored with 8 eggs.

BN

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Comments (6)

bluebars
18 years ago
Oh my gosh, I hope that's a big cavity! It must be difficult to monitor a tree cavity ... now that's dedication.
BlueBars
bridget_bb
18 years ago
Wow-- that's a lot!
We have questions - do you think all 8 will make it? Was there a large gap between the hatching of the first and last babies? Do you have any pics?
Those parents aren't going to have a minute spare are they??
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birding_nut
Original Author
18 years ago
I didn't get any pics of the babies. My technician checked the nest and said she counted 8 babies. I was quite surprised.

You might enjoy seeing these Hairy Woodpecker chicks I took a pic of on my monitoring device.

The pic isn't great since I took it of the monitor screen. They are about 20-21 days old and will fledge around 27-28 days old. There are 2 males visible and their sister is sort of visible on the left and below the boys. Not much room in there when they all start to get big. I guess someone has to be low man or lady on the totem pole. LOL. They had 5 eggs but 2 didn't hatch.

The cavity is in a ponderosa pine snag.

BN
green_t
18 years ago
Those Hairy chicks are too cute!!

In your research, do you see a lot of predation on the cavities? Are they manmade cavities in existing trees?

Tracey
birding_nut
Original Author
18 years ago
The birds I study are nesting in natural cavities, not manmade. Of course, the woodpeckers excavate their own and then the Western Bluebird nests I monitor are in abandoned woodpecker cavities.

As far as nest success goes, which is calcuated with a technique based on number of days a given nest is active and then pooled over all nests, it ranges from a high of about an 85% probability of success for Hairy and White-headed Woodpeckers to about 65% for Western Bluebirds. These probabilities of success are much higher than open-cup nesters such as finches, tanagers, vireos, etc, which can be as low as 15-20%.

The dominant predators on my sites are yellow-pine chipmunks, Douglas squirrels, and black bears.

BN
green_t
18 years ago
Interesting! When you said "monitor" I was picturing manmade tree cavities at a convenient level. I'm guessing a lot of the natural cavities are high up and monitored with cameras.

Bear predation!! That would be an awful sight. My biggest problem in my area are flying squirrels.

Thanks for the feedback!
Tracey

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