Bluebird Nest Boxes

At Ives Road Fen there is a bluebird nest box at the entrance to the central fen, one at the entrance to the volunteer area and one at the barn. Kristen Columbus has been monitoring and maintaining these boxes. Here is her report from May 19:

We have baby bluebirds in the boxes at the Central Fen entrance as well as the one by the barn. (Russell and I saw 3 birds for sure but there were 5 eggs in each box. There could easily be 2 more each underneath the others but we didn't want to handle the babies).

The box at the volunteer management unit has a house wren nest with one egg in it. We cleared out a wren nest about 10 days ago (not being sure if it was a dummy nest), it has since been rebuilt and the egg added.

The N. American Bluebird Society monitoring guidelines say that the nestlings stay in the nest for 17-18 days but that the box should be observed only from a distance from about day 13 until fledging so that they don't get frightened and leave prematurely. We estimate that hatching occurred about May 15 (+/- a day), so May 28th would be day 13 and we should steer clear of the boxes until that Saturday (June 2).