New Babies!

Some of our White Plymouth Rock pullets went broody so we set eggs under two of them.  Almost all of them hatched!

Can you see 3 little yellow fuzz balls peeking out from under this mama?

Day 2 and they are out of the nest and wandering about.  Mama is clucking at the chicks and puffing up to make herself look formidable in case we get any ideas about bothering the babies.  At night we put them in a large tote with a weighted screen top to protect them from black snakes.  Snakes really like to eat baby chicks and we really like to prevent them from doing so.  There are 13 babies in all.

Phoebe Babies

Baby phoebe birds waiting for mama

A pair of phoebe flycatchers made a nest on our porch this spring. Much like the swallow, the phoebe makes its nest with mud and other materials, adhering the nest to the side of something, like the siding on our porch! We had to move the porch chairs because the parents-to-be made a mess on everything flying over with slews of drippy, muddy nest materials!  And then the poop from the babies started dropping . . .lucky we'd moved the porch chairs.

The phoebe nest above the shutter on our porch

Since taking these photos, the 1st clutch of baby phoebes fledged.  You can click on this link to learn more about the phoebe flycatcher bird and to hear their call.

Apparently, after working so hard to construct this nest phoebes want to get a lot of use from it in a season.  A second clutch of eggs has recently hatched and the parents are busily flying back and forth feeding the babies.  Wonder if they'll do this again before fall comes?