Help!

17 years ago

I bought a regular birdhouse this spring and a pair of eastern bluebirds nested in it and laid 5 eggs. Three hatched and then fledged. I cleaned it out and in the meantime bought a bluebird nesting box and set it up in my yard. However, they again nested in the old birdhouse. This time 4 eggs were laid and 3 hatched. The babies grew and eventually got feathers but after monitoring them each day, I didn't see them opening their little mouths looking for food. They were barely breathing for a few days and I don't think they are breathing at all anymore. It's difficult trying to look through the hole of the birdhouse and it has no opening to looking into.

The parents keep coming back and sitting on the perch of the house looking in and then fly away. If I come out to give them some mealworms, they fly around me and after I leave will then fly to the house to look in and then leave again.

My question is, when will they realize that the babies are dead and should I take the house away or keep it there until they migrate for the winter?

This is my first experience with bluebirds and any help would be appreciated. I am so distraught over the second brood not surviving. I don't know what could have happened.

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Comments (2)

dzyg
17 years ago
What is the difference between your "regular" birdhouse and your bluebird house? A proper "Bluebird" house or any proper birdhouse does not have a perch. Are the birdhouses properly mounted on a metal pole with a predator baffle? Birdhouses either open from the top, from the front or from the side, this is what you would open up if you are monitoring them, not from the small hole the birds enter. Bluebird hatchlings only gape for food for a few days for anything other than their parents, after that they pretty much play dead if anything is looking into the nestbox. I think you need to open the box (like you would if you were cleaning it out) and look to make sure if the babies are alive or not but not if they are close to fledging day. When was hatching day for them, how old are they? Can you hear any cheaping around the box? Most bluebabies are quite noisey in the box however the ones we had this year were very quiet. If they are past day 13 (from hatching) you normally don't want to open the box to prevent premature fledging, they NEED at least 16 days from hatching to be good flyers. However if you really think they are dead (are there flies present or does it smell?) you probably should open the box and clean it out. When they are close to fledging the adults will fly to the box and then away as they try to encourage the little ones to leave the box, hopefully that is all you are seeing.

Good luck, I hope you are wrong and they are ok.

Donna
lisa11310
16 years ago
Ditto what Donna said. The older they get the better at playing "dead" they are. If The parents are flying around you they don't want you near. You said they are feathered so they may very well be gone the next time you look. Do you have house Sparrows? Start keeping a journal or simply write down dates such as "began nesting" or "first egg laid" "hatched" etc. on your calendar. You will have a better idea of whats going on. Pleas read the www.sialis.org website this winter so you will be well prepared for them next spring. I hope they are ok, go stand next to the box and listen you may catch some fluttering around. Let us know however it turns out.
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