Bye-bye Birdie!

We’ve been fortunate to have a nesting pair of Phoebes take residence under the back porch for the past four or five years.  They haven’t had the best of luck with their brood the past two seasons though, so this year I tried very hard to keep an eye out for them.

After they finished remodeling their nest, I took a picture of the eggs and found there was a cowbird egg in there.  Although I wasn’t crazy about doing it, I “evicted” the cowbird egg.

You can see the nest from the kitchen window, so I’ve been watching the parents bring birdie-lunch to the hatchlings every day.  I went up to take a peek in the nest a few times, but didn’t want to disturb them too much.

Until yesterday.  I just couldn’t keep my nosey self out of there so I grabbed my camera and took a few close-up shots of the trio.  I couldn’t believe how much they had grown…..and how in the world they managed to fit in that nest!

I snapped a couple of pictures and then scooted a bit closer and BAM!

Three fully feathered fledglings furiously flapped their wings past my face and into the tree next to the house!

I almost pee’d myself I was so startled!  Of course, now I feel guilty that I may have caused a premature exit from the nest, but they all managed to stay in the tree and the parents followed them to their new perch.

Good luck little guys!