Chickadee with nesting cloth (photo past Marcy Cunkelman)

21 May 2012:

Concluding week several families of chickadees fledged in Schenley Park.  Because they keep their nests well hidden, I had no idea so many chickadees were nesting until I encountered hotspots of begging babies.

What does a chickadee nest look like?  Marcy Cunkelman sent me photos of ane in her yard.

The Nest:

Chickadees build their nests in cavities using old woodpecker holes, birdhouses, or holes they excavate for themselves in soft rotting wood.  It takes a pair of chickadees 7-10 days to excavate a new hole 5″ deep.  While earthworks they acquit the fries away from the site.  Marcy'southward chickadees saved a lot of time by using the PVC-pipe birdhouse she provided.

Chickadee eggs and nest (photo by Marcy Cunkelman)

When the nesting hole is complete, the female spends 3-four days lining it with wool, hair, fur, moss, feathers, fuzzy insect cocoons, and cottony fibers(*).  When it's soft and cozy she lays 5-ten eggs.  Marcy's chickadee laid vi.

The Eggs

The eggs are fifteen.ii x 12.2 mm — smaller than a dime!  The female begins incubation after laying the side by side-to-terminal egg and incubates them alone until they hatch in 12-13 days.  Her mate feeds her on the nest so she doesn't take to go out the eggs.

Nestlings

When the eggs hatch the babies are naked and sightless merely presently begin to grow feathers as shown below.  At this phase their big wide mouths are their most noticeable feature.  The babies go along their parents busy filling those mouths.

Chickadee nestlings (photo past Marcy Cunkelman)

At 12 days old, the babies wait similar chickadees and are the same size as the adults.  They can fledge at this age if the nest is attacked but will look until they're 16 days old if the nest is safe. Here the half dozen babies are only a little too young to fledge.  They already look like chickadees.  Very beautiful!

Chickadee nestlings almost ready to fledge (photo by Marcy Cunkelman)

Unremarkably the entire brood fledges inside 24 hours.  Marcy says hers fledged while she was out for the solar day.

Chickadees usually raise but i brood per twelvemonth and then this pair is done for now — except that they have a large task alee of them. They have to teach six juveniles how to stay safe.

(photos by Marcy Cunkelman.  (*) Nesting information is from the Petersen Field Guide to Birds' Nests by Hal H. Harrison)

p.due south.  Black-capped and Carolina chickadees have mostly separate ranges (north and south) but on the chickadee edge they hybridize.  Marcy's business firm is on the chickadee border so she can't say for sure which species nests here.