Bluebird Trail Update

Sparrow Spooker by Lisa Gerbec

With the breeding season well underway, there has been activity on the Lewis Riding Ring Bluebird Trail.

Happily, Box 5 is currently housing 4 or 5 young Eastern Bluebirds. These birds are due to fledge on or about May 12 or May 13. Box 8 has 4 Eastern Bluebird eggs that are due to hatch any time now. Once that happens, we will be better able to determine the likely fledge date.

Unhappily, on April 24, monitors found a dead Tree Swallow in Box 2. A House Sparrow left the box as monitors approached. The Tree Swallow had damage to its head, so was likely killed by the House Sparrow. On April 29, monitors found a dead Tree Swallow in Box 1. This bird also had damage to the head.

Once eggs are found in a bluebird or Tree Sparrow nest in one of our boxes, we install a sparrow-spooker on top of the box. House Sparrows typically do not like the flapping Mylar streamers and will not disturb that box. However, extended use of the spookers is likely to result in familiarity, which could make the spookers ineffective. For this reason, we cannot simply cover every box with a sparrow-spooker.
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Monitoring will continue throughout the season.