More nests.....

The weather couldn't be better!    I love this cool spring, especially on sunny days and it looks like we have at least a couple more in store.   Next week, alas, looks rainy.  But you never can tell.  

I didn't get out yesterday as I was waiting for food deliveries.  But I had bushtits all around my house again and happy little birds they were as I now have a restocked suet feeder.  A pair seems to be hanging out more than the others and I have fond hopes I will have a nest here in the yard.  We'll see!  

I did get out the day before yesterday to Oaks Bottom and made three new discoveries:

1.  I found a nest being built by an unbanded pair in a rose vine on someone's porch very near Sellwood Park. This would be unremarkable except for the fact that this is the 4th year in a row bushtits have built in that very vine.  Last year's nest is still there....looking a bit forlorn, but almost usable.  The even-older nests are gone only because the owner trimmed back the vines last year.  Otherwise, 3 old bushtit nests would be hanging like soggy Xmas ornaments.  

2.  Remember the first year female W-X "rebuilding" at a nest that was built and used last year?  Well, that is happening no longer.  Instead, she and an unbanded male are building in the same tree but about 20' higher.  It's a very early stage nest so we'll see if they stick with it or if someone else takes over.  I did find the pair hanging with another pair near there later in the afternoon, suggesting the second pair in eying the nest site.  

3.  I found a very early stage nest (just a ring of spider web and lichen) along the Bluff trail that, if completed, will be so obvious to anyone on the trail that I am loath to reveal its location.  I find that nests that are that close to the trail often don't do well if people find out about them and stop and watch too much and too closely.  Crows are crafty and learn pretty quickly that bushtit nests are lovely hanging sacks of protein.  Sad for the bushtit families. 

Which brings me to.......

Reed College!   My amazing field assistant, Amelia, who was with me last year, has started searches for nests on campus and so far she has seen banded birds (GYYX and another banded male) with an unbanded female hanging out around an old nest site.  More on that later.......time to go find my birds!