nest – Page 5

Home Work

A Gila woodpecker pecks above the entrance to his current nest with an older nest around the corner. I couldn’t tell if he was grabbing an insect or if he was doing some home improvement. I haven’t posted much lately as I’ve been busy doing home work of my own, we’ve started looking for a house in earnest and I’ve been doing a lot of research on our various options. We’ve narrowed the search down to our two favorites and I think we’ll make an offer on one of them tomorrow. One of the two is a bit further from work than I’d like but it is only about 10 to 15 minutes away from several of my favorite hiking locations, including Brown’s Ranch where I took this picture back in April.

Changing of the Guard

A male Gila woodpecker prepares to leave the nest as his partner brings a spider for their hungry children inside the saguaro. Both parents excavate the nest cavity, the cactus will slowly harden the inside to prevent water loss and it is only then that the woodpeckers can use the cavity as a nest. You can see how much of the surrounding surface of the saguaro has been scraped away as they created their home and now land over and over again.

New Homes

It was one year ago today they brought my team in and laid us all off, setting in motion our eventual move from our longtime home in Portland to our new home in Arizona. We’re renting for now but will start looking to buy within a month or two. This Gila woodpecker made his new home near the old, moving slightly around the saguaro. Other small birds sometimes use the old nests after the woodpeckers abandon them. Getting to see such new sights has been part of the fun of moving to such a different location.

Humility

On April 28th I arrived at my first visit to Brown’s Ranch in McDowell Sonoran Preserve, my fifth hike and fourth hiking location since moving to Arizona a month prior. I was pleased that even though I arrived mentally and physically exhausted I was forcing myself to go out and explore some area parks, even though it meant getting up a while before sunrise. As soon as I stepped past the welcome center I was reminded that while I should be proud of all I had accomplished the past six months, my struggles had been minor compared to what many face every day. There in the arms of a saguaro, the light just cresting the distant hills, stood a cactus wren with a twig in its mouth, building a nest in such a seemingly inhospitable host in a seemingly inhospitable land. Brown’s Ranch became an immediate favorite as did the plucky wrens that in the coming weeks I got to watch not just build their nests but raise their families in them.

Side Entrance

A cactus wren prepares to enter its nest in the arms of a saguaro, the nest has a side entrance and a covered roof.

Moths For Breakfast Again? That’s It, I’m Leaving!

A female Gila woodpecker brings a moth to the nest as the male prepares to leave (the moth was for the hungry babies inside). The parents brought a variety of insects (and spiders, as she has in her beak below) to their nest in the old saguaro. The male seemed to spend more time in the nest and the female more time hunting during the mornings I watched them. It required a bit of a hike to get to the nest so I couldn’t get there right at first light but it was a treat to watch them nevertheless. I will always be amazed by the relentless energy parents spend getting their babies past those precarious early days.

I also have a 4K clip of them at the nest which I’ll learn to edit at some point and post here. Both pictures are from this spring after we had been in Arizona for about six weeks.

A Cactus Home

I hoped for this picture since I first learned that woodpeckers like the Gila woodpecker make their nests in cavities they drill into saguaros. I wasn’t sure how frequent a sight it would be until we moved here and thankfully I had the chance to watch a couple of different Gila woodpecker families this spring. This male and its mate made their hole facing the rising sun but it was a bit too long of a hike to get there right at sunrise. But I spent several early mornings watching in amazement as they brought an endless stream of insects and spiders to the nest.

Home on the Road

Killdeer nest on the ground in a shallow depression, often in gravel or sand, which is a bit of an issue at a place like Ridgefield where a gravel auto tour runs beside the many small ponds. A killdeer had laid four eggs in this nest at the edge of the road near the end of the auto tour, where the camouflage of the eggs will work against the likelihood of them not getting run over when the parents aren’t on the nest.

It Turns Out, I Can Be Wrong

This bald eagle pair has been courting at Ridgefield each spring but I always assumed they nested elsewhere. Apparently not. I had never seen a bald eagle nest before — it was massive. The two youngsters rested while their parents kept a watchful eye from a nearby tree. The young eagles looked pretty big, I suspect they’ll fledge soon, but I could be wrong. Again.