Baby birds

While sitting watching the traps for Kelly Bryan as he banded hummingbirds this morning I spotted a juvenile Black-throated Sparrow. It was following an adult around begging at every opportunity.

Suddenly I realized that I had taken a photo of something else, beside the fledgling, by mistake. It was a baby Ladder-backed Woodpecker, being assaulted by ants, and too young to be out of the nest cavity.

I picked it up, and in my haste to put it back into the Ladder-backed cavity in a nearby agave stalk (the same stalk the Elf Owls are nesting in), I accidentally put it in the wrong agave stalk. And I couldn't retrieve it no matter how hard I tried. So, in desperation, I cut open the side of the stalk and put it in its proper hole.

 A while later I saw an adult come out of the hole but I didn't see feeding activity. There may not be enough food available, in which case the adults may not feed the young. I simply don't know without monitoring the nest. And I don't have time to sit there all day doing that, as much as I'd like too. Had to haul water, then go to Alpine to pick and dry apricots.

Kelly ended up recapturing quite a few hummers, including one gravid (with egg) female and one that had just laid an egg. Unlike last year, it seems we've had enough rain for some of the birds to make nesting attempts.