I am always amazed by the beauty and finesse of a birds nest built with only a beak ! NO hands !! From gathering of materials to construction Food for thought ! How is that for sustainability ? LOL.
Last spring our Little Brown Honey eater decided that our shed was the ideal place for the nursery .
I have lived here for over 40 years and this was a first for us . I felt honoured that they trusted us so much.
The placement of the nest was interesting to say the least they chose to build in a plastic bottle that I had cut down to serve as a container for string etc. (shown below)
They must have put a lot of thought into their choice for when the storms arrived a few weeks later and other baby birds were no doubt becoming sea sick and wet from the high wind and battering our babies were safe warm, peaceful and dry, also it was at that stage, cool in the shed. Right outside there is a dear little bird bath just right for refreshment and bathing. What more could a bird want ?
So now these choices being made the serious part began.
There can't be a lazy bone in a bird's body , how they worked there were times when there seemed to be long intervals between the nest so maby they did slack off of times at times but when you work that hard you have a right to a little R&R.
Great care was always taken to arrive and leave the nest site with as little visibility as possible, first flying into the big tree and then on to the Loquat were it is only a meter to the nest but even then once inside the shed another check was made.
Every spring I leave all the spider webs on the exterior of my home as this is an important material for nest building !
In the nest above it seems that they used grasses and fine sticks for the outer wall some tissue paper but I am not sure what the lining is it appears to be very very fine almost dust like and soft.
I remain in awe at the effort these tiny creatures put into making this nest their beaks are tiny and they themselves weigh a mere 60 gms, so there would be thousands of trips searching and returning with little sticks and other important stuff
Last spring our Little Brown Honey eater decided that our shed was the ideal place for the nursery .
I have lived here for over 40 years and this was a first for us . I felt honoured that they trusted us so much.
The placement of the nest was interesting to say the least they chose to build in a plastic bottle that I had cut down to serve as a container for string etc. (shown below)
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| Brown Honeyeater's nest |
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| Our sweet little Brown Honeyeater |
So now these choices being made the serious part began.
There can't be a lazy bone in a bird's body , how they worked there were times when there seemed to be long intervals between the nest so maby they did slack off of times at times but when you work that hard you have a right to a little R&R.
Great care was always taken to arrive and leave the nest site with as little visibility as possible, first flying into the big tree and then on to the Loquat were it is only a meter to the nest but even then once inside the shed another check was made.
Every spring I leave all the spider webs on the exterior of my home as this is an important material for nest building !
In the nest above it seems that they used grasses and fine sticks for the outer wall some tissue paper but I am not sure what the lining is it appears to be very very fine almost dust like and soft.
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| The soft dust like lining |
I remain in awe at the effort these tiny creatures put into making this nest their beaks are tiny and they themselves weigh a mere 60 gms, so there would be thousands of trips searching and returning with little sticks and other important stuff
I love how you make your back yard as fascinating as hectares of bushlandxx
ReplyDeleteThank you Coral !!
DeleteMust say I do enjoy and treasure it much more since I became interested in learning about the creatures that I live with on this block.