Posted on 06/08/2008 3:43:34 PM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
(Volunteers ensure happiness of bluebirds by erecting nesting boxes for the species)
Mequon, WI - Ellen Lafouge opened the wooden box and peered in at four tiny balls of fluff slumbering in a nest of dry grass.
"It's almost like Christmas and finding a present," said Lafouge.
It wasn't Christmas - actually, it was late May - and Lafouge was standing near the 18th hole at Mee-Kwon Park. But the gift would soon begin a chorus of chirps, a sound that's as welcome to Lafouge as "Jingle Bells."
The tiny, week-old bluebirds have Lafouge and other members of the Bluebird Restoration Association of Wisconsin to thank for creating a system of trails throughout the state that's helping this once-thriving bird bounce back.
Lafouge and other human mother hens in the association build small wooden boxes with the right size holes - big enough for bluebirds but too small for other species - and install them on poles too slippery for cats, raccoons or other predators to shinny up. Association members place the boxes where bluebirds like to congregate and monitor them weekly, beginning in April and continuing through the summer.
The effort has been so successful that Wisconsin leads the nation in restoring the beautiful azure bird. Last year, 28,244 Eastern bluebirds were fledged from 7,861 nesting boxes scattered throughout the state. That was 34% more than the previous year and bested Nebraska's national record of more than 26,000 bluebirds fledged in 2006.
Species has declined
Decades ago bluebirds were common, but over the years their numbers dropped precipitously for a variety of reasons. Causes range from loss of habitat to an increase in pesticides and predators such as European starlings, house sparrows and raccoons.
Bluebirds like to nest in cavities such as holes in wooden fences and abandoned woodpecker holes. When farmers switched from wooden fences to metal or wire, bluebirds lost prime nesting spots.
By 1986, the Eastern bluebird population had declined by about 90% in its historic range, which includes Wisconsin, according to the restoration association, which has about 850 members.
Now the number of bluebirds is growing because humans are giving them safe places to rear their young.
"We've just got this fire in us, and I guess it's because we like nature a lot and because we can help this particular bird," said Bob Tamm, a bluebird restoration group member who has set up trails in Muskego, Waterford and New Berlin.
Last September, Lafouge got permission from Mee-Kwon Park officials to set up 25 bluebird nesting boxes around the 18-hole golf course. Lafouge picked a golf course because bluebirds can easily spot the delectable insects they eat in the cropped grass while perching in nearby trees.
In Box No. 1 in the rough near the 18th hole, four bluebird chicks huddled together, their wings folded up like origami. The parents were gone, likely foraging for bugs to feed to their family.
Lafouge began checking the boxes on the trail in early April, when bluebirds begin showing up in Wisconsin after spending the winter in southern Illinois, Arkansas, Kentucky and other warmer states. By April 27 a nest had been constructed inside Box No. 1, and four light blue, jellybean-sized eggs appeared by May 8. It normally takes about two weeks for bluebird eggs to incubate, and when Lafouge checked the box on May 22 she saw four chicks.
Once the bluebird chicks leave the nest in a few weeks, Lafouge and other bluebird association members clean out the boxes so the birds can build nests for a second brood. Typically the first brood is four to five eggs while the second is one egg fewer. So far, 47 chicks have hatched from 10 boxes on Lafouge's bluebird trail.
Association members must intervene when European starlings and house sparrows invade the boxes, since they will attack and can decapitate bluebirds.
"Once that sparrow has that bluebird trapped, that's the end of the bluebird," said Tamm.
Hunt from perches
The ideal spot for bluebirds is open oak savanna where they can perch in a tree and search for insect prey below, said Kent Hall, a retired University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point biology professor who coordinates the collection of bluebird restoration data in the state.
Why go to all this trouble? Hall, who started the Aldo Leopold Audubon Society's Eastern Bluebird Trail in seven central Wisconsin counties, said restoring bluebirds helps bring back a native species and encourages a conservation ethic.
"We brought them back to a good population, and in the process we've educated a tremendous number of people about the plight of the bluebird," Hall said.
In the six years since the Aldo Leopold Audubon Society's Eastern Bluebird Trail was formed, more than 12,000 songbirds have fledged from more than 700 nesting boxes. Last year the trail won the Outstanding Bluebird Conservation Organization of the Year Award from the North American Bluebird Society.
"Through human intervention, we've been able to bring this bird back from a low population size. My point is, the bluebird should be a model for what we can do for wildlife throughout the world," said Hall.
For more information, check out the Bluebird Restoration Association of Wisconsin at http://www.braw.org
I had 3 bluebirds in my yard all winter, here in New Hampshire!
They are so pretty! I’ve given up on Bluebirds, though my MIL has them just a few miles down the road from me. We took a class on attracting them a few year back; she obviously took better notes than I did, LOL!
My recent “conquests” have been attracting Orioles; I’ve had a nesting pair for two years running, and Rose-Breasted Grosbeak, also a nesting pair for the past two seasons.
If you feed them, they will come...kind of like teenagers, LOL!
They sure are purty though.
I love songbirds...
I have an Eastern Bluebird nest in one of my boxes with five little ones (if they haven’t fledged already). I’m afraid to open the box this late in the season but will in a week or two just to make certain that they made it. All kinds of dangers here in south Mississippi.
I’m looking out my window presently at my bluebird box. I’ve already ‘fathered’ three new Bluebirds this year and it looks like they’re preparing for another brood. It is very rare but I’ve had three broods in one year before, two broods often.
Do Not Use Treated Wood. (I use cedar or cypress wood.)
Male(left), Female(right)
How many to make a decent sammich? ;)
Way to go, Wisconsin. This might be something other states can emulate.
They’re thick in eastern Iowa.
A Bluebird Sandwich isn’t any good unless it’s topped with Hummingbird Tongue. :)
but we had one bad occurance...even though the boxes were built to specs, a small squirrel went into one of the boxes....I saw him do it....I screamed for my husband who calmly went out and "took care of" the critter....I know that I already had one bluebird killed by something and I suspect it was the dang squirrel....
but more beautiful than the eastern bluebird is the mountain bluebird....a startling pale blue.....I see them rarely except maybe in the Blue Mountains south of here....
anyone ever see an albino bird?....I saw an albino robin a week ago....
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