I went down to check the creek this afternoon and there was a snowy egret feeding there. He had some very nice breeding plumes, but he wasn't showing them off.
My main purpose of going out today was to check the nestboxes. It was warm and there were no mothers in any of the three boxes, so I was glad that I didn't disturb anyone.
The box that I showed you the five eggs in now has five babies! They are only a few days old. They wiggled around and one lifted an open mouth briefly but too fast for me to get a picture.
Click larger for better detail
The second box I checked had five new Carolina wren eggs in it. The nest itself was very different--they fill the whole box with nest material and made an entrance on the side of it. You can see the holder that the nest is built in--it shows just below my thumb. This enables me to lift the nest out briefly for a photo and stick it right back in again. The eggs are a lot like the chickadee eggs. 
The bluebird nest in complete and has two eggs in it so far. Unlike the chickadee nest, which has all sorts of material in it, the bluebird nest is made entirely of pine straw. To me the eggs looked bluer than they are in the photos, which are a little on the turquoise-y side.
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Thanks.
