A Sad Story

Dear Sarah,

Today's blog entry isn't quite so happy. Yesterday morning I took a picture of our eggs on the front porch to see if any of them had hatched. Nope, still four intact eggs.

Look, they've moved again!

When Puppa came home yesterday afternoon he said it looked like one of the eggs had fallen from the nest. Sometimes a mother bird will sense that an egg isn't quite right and kick it out of the nest.

Do you see the little specks of the blue shell? Remember, you can click the mouse on the picture to make it bigger.

I decided to take a picture of the three remaining eggs but this is what I saw instead.



Just one little egg was left. Then I remembered that around noon I saw a big crow land on the porch rail. A crow is a very, very big black bird. I remembered it because I have never seen a crow in my yard before.

I wonder if that big old crow robbed the nest. Sometimes birds will eat the eggs of another. That sounds so mean but that's how nature works. Everything is food for something else. Here's what a crow looks like. You can't tell how big it is from the picture but it was about as long as your arm.



I guess the crow solved the problem of how on earth four baby birds were going to grow up in that tiny nest. Remember how big the two babies got last year? I'll find the picture so you can see them again.

Two hatchlings barely fit in the nest

I checked the nest in the tree this morning and found two little blue eggs safe and sound and the mother bird threatening to poke my eyes out so I better leave them alone now.



I'm glad you had such a great time at the beach! I can't wait to hear about it next week.

Love,
Ms. Carol

Robins in the Hood

Dear Sarah E.,

I couldn't wait a whole week to share my news with you. There have been some little changes in the nests in our yard that I thought you would be curious about.

First, look at the nest in the willow tree to see if you can find the momma robin. You can click on the picture to make it really big so you can see better. Only her tail feathers stick out of the nest. I thought that was neat.



Remember Friday afternoon we only found one little egg in the nest in the tree?



Monday I took another picture and found two eggs! I'll keep watching. Maybe there will be more yet.



Oh, another thing, in the nest on the porch light there are four eggs. I have taken several pictures of them so that I will know when they hatch. After viewing the pictures I noticed something really strange going on.


Look at each picture of the four eggs.





Notice how the eggs are in different positions in each picture?



How do you think they are moving around? I haven't touched them and Puppa hasn't touched them. I haven't even let Noah get close to them! So how are they moving around?

I had to call Nana the Great. Nana says that the mother bird rolls the eggs around. I guess so that they get done "over easy" or maybe it's so that the porch light doesn't cook the little baby's left wing to it's beak.

P.S. Are you sure you don't want me to scramble the eggs for your breakfast one day? If so, we should probably do it pretty soon or they may taste a little feathery. Eeeeewww! Ha ha

You and your family have a wonderful week!

Love,
Ms. Carol