Re: [SBB] Bird Box Questions

["Garth Harwood" <[[email protected]]>]

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Hi Kendric,

>From your description, it's almost a sure thing that your nest was that of a
chickadee. As far as removing the nest goes, I think either choice is
usually fine (based on nearly 1,000 nestboxes monitored over the past
decade). Chickadees in particular sometimes feel compelled to remove old
material on their own before rebuilding.

For myself, I remove old nests if they were well-used (i.e. messy or carried
young all the way to fledging) or of course if there was evidence of
sickness or parasites in the nest. Parasite eggs or larvae can be embedded
in the material in such cases. If the nest is spotless and was only used
briefly I often leave it in, as much for winter-roosting birds as for the
next year's tenants.

Good luck,

Garth Harwood

----------
>From: "Kendric C. Smith" <[[email protected]]>
>To: [[email protected]]
>Subject: [SBB] Bird Box Questions
>Date: Fri, Dec 9, 2005, 5:30 PM
>

>I am cleaning out our bird boxes (4), but only 1 was used.
>
>The one nest was beautiful.  About 2 inches of redwood bark (?) put 
>down in a circular pattern in a square box.  On top was about an inch 
>of animal hair.
>
>Question #1:  Although I did not leave it in the box, I wonder if I 
>should have left it in the box.  It was a lot of work for the bird. 
>I cleaned it out and put in some wood shavings.  Answer?
>
>Question #2:  I have seen this type of nest before, but I have 
>forgotten which bird builds the base with redwood bark.  The two 
>probable choices are Chestnut-backed Chickadee and Oak Titmouse. 
>Answer?
>
>-- 
>Kendric C. Smith, Ph.D.
>927 Mears Court
>Stanford, CA  94305-1041
>(650) 493-7210
>[[email protected]]
>http://www.stanford.edu/~kendric/
>
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