03.15.09

Bye, Bye Bluebirds.

Well, I guess the match wasn't meant to be. As I mentioned in my last post, the bluebirds had not been around the entire week...and I haven't seen any action around the box this weekend. Oh well, Chad said it wasn't "my female." (Not exactly sure how he could tell that.) So I guess it's a good thing the pair didn't set-up camp.

It's interesting because I haven't seen any other bluebirds in the neighborhood...until just this morning. While letting Bailey out back a little while ago I heard one. Looking around I saw three a few houses down. I looked back on my calendars from the last three years:
2006 - I first saw the male on March 11th, female March 12th. The pair stayed and nested.
2007 - On March 6th I saw a male down the block and then one at the nesting box on March 11th.
2008 - They were much earlier last year. I saw a male come in from across the street on February 24th. I cleaned out the box while he sat in the scrub oak and watched.

I have to head out back and fill the feeders this morning, so I'm considering taking the nesting box down and scraping some of the flicker "remnants" off the top...maybe it's a turn-off to the bluebirds.

On another bluebird note, my sister and her husband moved into a new house (also in a new development with little to no landscaping) and they had a pair show up yesterday. They saw the male in the AM and later in the PM the female partially went in the hole on the side of their grill and then flew off. Within just a few seconds, the male came flying OUT of the grill. This pair must be ready to nest at any expense! My sister and brother-in-law started doing some planning of where they could put a nesting box. The problem is they still have to do their landscaping. It will be exciting to see what happens.