Chickadee in the house

Well, I didn't get any bluebirds nesting in one of the bluebird boxes in my yard for the first nesting this year. The bluebirds spent a lot of time checking out the available apartments, but choose one in my next door neighbor's yard instead. That box is also one that I built and it has been very productive in terms of bluebirds for my neighbor. I have had bluebirds in my yard every year, but not for both nestings. Hopefully, I will get them for the 2nd nesting again this year.

However, all is not lost because we do have an occupant...a cute little Carolina Chickadee. This is the common chickadee of Tennessee. Northerners are familiar with the black-capped chickadee. These birds are nearly identical except for their song, but the black-capped cousin lives only in the higher altitudes of the Smokies in Tennessee.

I had noticed the Carolina chickadee checking out the nest box for a couple of days and then I saw her flying back and forth with nesting material. Their nests are mostly moss and the inner cup of the nest uses a lot of animal fur. The chickadee nest fills up about half of the box and the nest cup is deep. There is no mistaking a chickadee nest for a bluebird nest, although a tufted titmouse nest is very similar to a chickadee nest and the eggs are very similar too. Here is a good website to help you identify the nests of various birds.

There are 6 eggs in the nest and they are really very small...smaller than bluebird eggs. You can click on the picture for a bigger view. The female and the male both will sit on the nest for 11-12 days until the babies hatch. I have checked the box twice since the eggs were laid and both times one tap on the side of the box and the adult zooms out of the box. Bluebirds will often stay sitting on the nest even as you open the side and look in and stay there after you close the box and move away. However, I have read that chickadees are one wild bird that will easily tame and come to your hand for seeds. I will have to see if Nancy wants to work on that since she had the patience to entice a hummingbird to sit on her thumb and sip sugar water from her hand.

So even though we don't have any bluebirds at least we have a chickadee in the house.