I find more eggs everyday. I found another 11 today. At this point I'm just gonna stop counting and hope they all make it. I have so many tubs and I'm in process of building a large housing cage for the chrysalis' and a lady brought me a 20 gal aquarium that I'm going to keep inside to better house all these cats. I have been having issues with them disappearing. But I'm pretty sure some are getting eaten by others. I did have one cat out of the first batch of ten that randomly died. I'm think he wandered to far from the food and starved himself while I was away. I have 12 cats right now. One chrysalis and one in process. And then I have about 70 eggs I'm waiting on to hatch.

I wish I knew the cause for the low turnout, though. The nest box is safe from climbing predators. The only predator that I can think of is the house wren. They are known to predate chickadee (and other) nests by puncturing the eggs so that they cannot hatch. I will know better after the breeding season is over and examine the eggs. House wrens are also known to kill very young chickadee hatchlings. But the 3 hatchlings are luckily too big by now (5 days) to be killed by house wrens. I have not seen or heard any house wrens, but I have not paid too much attention either.

Yes Lexa, HOSP will even nest in spruces! Tight evergreens are places HOSP LOVE to build their domed nests. It's angering. But take note that House finches STRONGLY resemble HOSP from afar. Make sure you here the distinctive chirp before using any guns! We had some HOFI nest around here. The HOSP don't nest in the pines near this property anymore. And I'm also overwhelmed seeing all the juveniles. They truly breed like RATS! ARG! 2 neighbor's they nest at...and are of course fed all summer... :/ What's worse is now I have NO decoys. I have 2 bb guns. Both miss about 90% of the time. I have shaky hands too. I was lucky enough to nail one juvie when the flock showed up in my yard, and one year nailed a male HOSP. I'm gonna resurrect my DRST again in a week or two. My neighbors have parties around the 4th so it would be a bad idea any time soon. I wish I had a better gun! D$5n HOSP! HATE EM! The 5 nestlings appear to be doing good. Mom and Dad are feeding well or so it would seem. Can't wait to finally have some juvie Bluebirds to counteract all these HOSP! ~Tim~

No, not necessarily. Sometimes you'll have a big gap between first and last to hatch. The longest gap I had was 40 hours and when it was time for the five to fledge the baby who hatched late was far from ready. That didn't stop him from jumping out of the box but he could not fly so he spent the night back in the box with a one inch hole reducer added (I was prepared and already had the reducer). I'd give unhatched eggs three FULL days from the time the first hatched before deciding they are infertile.