Well, our wren adventure that began on May 8th ended today, Saturday, June 21, 2014, between 9:30 and 10 a.m. The Good Lord allowed me to watch as all SEVEN baby wrens took flight for the first time. I can’t begin to describe the joy I felt as each baby took that leap of faith and flew for the first time into the crab apple tree. And I have to admit to some incredulity as we discovered there were seven babies in that small gourd!
I hope you enjoy this small sampling of photos that I took to record the precious event. I was able to capture six of the seven as they fledged but the last one took so long to make up its mind that I had relaxed my camera and by time it jumped out, there was no time to focus and snap a photo. I did not put all six of the other photos in this gallery, but I chose twelve of my favorite images from this morning. I feel these portray the fun and excitement of the morning quite well.
Please click on any image for a larger view.
- What are these wing things?
- Getting a breath of fresh air.
- Last breakfast in the nest.
- It’s very crowded in here!
- These faces crack me up!
- It’s almost time to go.
- First to take flight.
- Next on the launching pad.
- Number two is out, five more to go.
- Sibling number 4 on its way.
- Number 6 smells the open air.
- Hey, where did everybody go?
I have to admit, the afternoon has seemed awfully quiet without the peeping and cheeping of the wrens wafting through my kitchen window. I went out after I showered and dressed to see if any of them were still hanging around the Rose of Sharon or the crab apple tree, but none were to be found.
Upon finding there were seven babies in the nest, Mark made the rather bleak observation, “wow, seven is a lot, that must mean they have a really high mortality rate”. Not exactly what I wanted to hear! Well, if God cares for the sparrows, I’m sure He cares for the wrens, too, so I will trust He will watch over them. I’m thrilled He allowed me to see all seven of them fledge!
You made the most of being in the right place at the right time. Mark may be right though. Big broods do tend to mean low long term survival rates.
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Nature must have her way, I suppose. I will hope for the best and I’m sure we’ll have another nesting pair next year. 🙂
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What fun! I love the picture where the three of them have their heads out, looking about. And I’m pretty sure they will all live happily ever after. 🙂
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I will choose to believe it to be so! 🙂 We ate dinner on the patio tonight, it was so quiet! I miss the little buggers!
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They’re so cute, too bad that they had to leave!
You should remind Mark that the mortality rate for humans is 100%, no one lives forever. 😉
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Hahaha, that’s true! 😀 I remember last month sitting in the doctor’s office watching their closed-circuit TV thing and they were talking about eating healthy and how people that didn’t had a such-and-such-percent higher chance of dying and I was like “I think we all have a 100% chance of dying!” LOL
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Amy, you’ve done such a terrific job with your camera. The series of photos are excellent! Congratulations! 🙂
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Well Thank You H.J! I appreciate that very much!! All my friends on here have been so encouraging, it’s really helped me a lot!!
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A blessing indeed! I have wrens in my backyard, too. I thank God everyday for the wonderful bird song from morning to night. Wikipedia says that a male wren will sing 3000 times a day. And I never tire of their music!
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I sure miss them now that they have fledged. I loved listening to the male sing every day. It’s so quiet on my patio now!!
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