Tree Swallows Nesting

American Goldfinch male bird

The cute little goldfinches are back! They love the nyger seeds in the feeder.

We put out the oriole feeder and the hummingbird feeder and managed to attract both already.  No photos yet of the little hummingbirds. They are really hard to photograph; they rarely sit still long ! Got a rather fuzzy photo of the oriole through the screen before he dashed away. Now that he knows where the feeder is, we hope he'll be back soon and we can possibly get a better one. :) 

Baltimore Oriole (photo taken through the screen)

We make our own sugar water  the same for both feeder actually. 3 parts water to 1 part sugar. Boil 3 cups of water in a pan and then add the cup of sugar, stirring well. I add a few drops of food coloring for 2 reasons. Hummingbirds are attracted to the color red and also so that I can tell at a glance how much sugar water is left in the feeder.

The tree swallows are still my favourites as far as summer song birds go. We have a nest camera in one of the birdhouses where the swallows always nest and it was interesting to watch the female swallow carefully chosing each item to place in her nest. The most coveted thing seems to be white feathers. There were actually a few feathers in the nest from last year. We noticed them when we brought the birdhouse inside the house to install the camera on the flip-up lid. Usually in the fall after the birds have fledged all their babies, we make a point of cleaning out all the old nests. That way there is less problem with ticks and parasites.  The swallows had already scrounged these white feathers from somewhere and stashed them in the birdhouse for this season's nest.

Mama Swallow Laying egg #1

The male swallow brought her a feather into the birdhouse at one point and she spent  some time trying it out in various spots. I helped out a bit by fulling a few small white feathers out of my feather pillow and letting them float on the wind outside.

It took her over a week to build the nest.  She began laying her eggs on Sunday morning, May 22. At the end of the day, she covered the single egg carefully with feathers before leaving for the night. Monday morning she laid a second egg and that night she covered them up and left again to spend the night somewhere in the trees.

The third egg was laid on Tuesday morning (May 24) just after 8:00 am and that day she spent a lot of time sitting on the eggs. That night (May 24) Mama swallow spent the first night on her nest keeping the eggs warm.  The next day, she laid a fourth egg (Wed. May 25). After that she spent a lot of time sitting on her eggs and we seldom got a glance of the eggs themselves.

Laying egg #2

3 eggs now (May 24)

4 eggs in the nest (May 25)

We were quite busy for a few days with yard work and gardening and didn't view the nest very much. Imagine our surprise this morning (May 30) when we caught a glimpse of the inside of the birdhouse after Mama left to feed and discovered there were 6 eggs now!

6 eggs in total

We are so excited about viewing this whole baby bird raising!  In about 10 days, the first laid egg should start to hatch. We'll find out if all 6 eggs will hatch or not. That is an awfully big family to feed! Sometimes the last egg or two don't make it, but time will tell.