Yep, The Wrens Have Babies!

Well, the Carolina Wrens have been busy for the past few days feeding the latest babies in the birdhouse on the porch.  It's always such a joy for them to nest on the porch where we can watch the goings on and (hopefully) be there when the little ones fly.

I guess you can see the birdhouse that my husband made has been painted - well, that's the primer coat at least!  He got tired of me procrastinating about it and slapped on the primer while he was painting the various bluebird houses we have around this past winter.  I still need to give it the final finish coats but it looks as if it will be a while!  There will probably be one more nesting before fall so I won't disturb it until we're sure there won't be any more need for the house this year.

The Wrens Are Back In Town!

Most of you know that my favorite bird is the little Carolina Wren.  Over the past couple of years we've had them nest on our covered porch just a foot or so from the kitchen door.  More of my time has been wasted watching these perky little birds than just about anything else I've done. 

Well, we've noticed a pair of them building a nest in the bird house we put up a couple of years ago.  However, the wrens will often build nests that they never use - decoy nests if you will.  Since the building of the nest in our birdhouse, we haven't really seen either of the wrens.  That doesn't mean they aren't using the nest though.  Last year we thought they'd nested somewhere else and it wasn't until the pair started to feed the babies that we realized that they had actually occupied the nest.  Like I said, this was less than 2 feet from our kitchen door which has an all glass storm door and which we keep open to allow light into the kitchen most of the time.

I'm giddy with excitement and will keep you posted on whether we have babies this year or not!  In the mean time, here's a painting I did of one of our fledglings last year.

 Carolina Wren Fledgling

Watercolor

Then There Were Three!

Yep, we looked outside yesterday and a third baby raccoon had joined the other two.  Two of the little ones are fairly skittish but one doesn't seem to mind me taking photos of him.  Here is one photo of the three of them together that I was fortunate enough to get.

They were across the fence peering at me like the little masked bandits they are!

This has been an exceptionally good week for wildlife sightings and already before 8:30 this morning, we've seen deer, a wild turkey, a hawk, bluebirds and humming birds as well as a multitude of various other birds.  There have also been an abundance of butterflies and insects of all kinds.  Can you spot the bee in the following photo?

And, our wren house has new tenants!  We didn't even know there were wrens nesting in the house until the Mama and Papa Carolina Wrens began feeding the babies.

As before, this photo was taken through the glass storm door and isn't as clear as it could be.  At least you can see one of the parents feeding the babies.  Hopefully, I'll be able to get some photos of the babies when they start to leave the nest in a couple of weeks.

It's times like this when I'm really glad we live in the country.

Carolina Wrens and Other Things

A pair of my favorite birds, the Carolina Wren, have decided to nest in one of the houses we built for them last year.  After the nesting season ended my DH hung the house near the kitchen door as a reminder for me to paint it - as you can see, that didn't get done!  The pair of wrens don't seem to mind though and seem very content with the house as it is.  I've read that a pair will build several different nests before finally deciding to lay eggs and raise a family in one.  I'm just glad this pair chose this house.  Photo was taken through the glass storm door so may not be as sharp as it could be.

I was so tickled to have the birds nesting nearby that I decided to paint them.  The following is the result with many errors that I can see.  Also, if I had it to do all over again, I wouldn't paint such a close-up view.  Carolina Wrens are small birds and such a composition makes this one look huge.

watercolor on Arches 140 CP paper

One of my favorite paintings done recently is this rooster.  It was painted in watercolor on Yupo which is a sort of plastic paper.  Painting on Yupo is what I imagine herding cats is like.  The paint beads up and must be painted in more of a dabbing technique than what is usually used with watercolor.  Also, the paint will rewet very easily or even scratch when it does dry so this painting was sprayed with a UV resistant acrylic coating.

Watercolor on Yupo

 Have also been doing quite a few watercolor sketches/practice pieces as well as an exercise from an online forum.  The following is the result of an exercise to use contrast to help define the center of interest.  The reference was some of our daffodils (which are nearly gone now).

Watercolor on Paper

Both of these are relatively unfinished and I doubt I ever finish them.  However, I may do an entirely new painting based on this reference photo - someday!  It was a challenge for me to paint the same thing twice in a row so I'm not in any hurry to do it for a third time.

I think there are other things I've done recently but they either went into the trash can or are so immemorial that I've forgotten them!  I did work up a small sketch for a larger painting that I want to paint eventually.  My DH likes this one and calls the subject 'Barry' and you'll see why if you scroll down a bit!  (Yes, 'Barry' and not 'Beary' - don't ask!  lol)

Watercolor on Paper

I don't know when I'll actually paint it as I haven't worked out the composition I want quite yet. 

So, I have been painting but it's like walking and chewing gum - if I paint, I don't seem to be able to do anything else at the same time so you all don't get any blog posts! 

I do try to keep up - honest!

First Tenents!

I'm kinda excited as we noticed a couple of Carolina Wrens investigating a new style birdhouse we put up on the porch.  This morning we noticed a piece of grass/straw hanging out of the house!

 You may remember the wren house we put up a week or so ago - well, even though the wrens still kept trying to build a nest in the ceiling fan (see photo on the left), they totally ignored the house my DH built.  I did a bit more research and found that the wrens don't like houses with small entry holes even though larger birds can't enter to take over the nest or destroy the wren eggs.

So my husband built another house and made the entry hole really large, almost 3" in diameter!  This house design is very unique and easy to build as the body of it is actually an old metal coffee can!  That's the house we have hanging up now.

The larger hole did the trick and we now have a pair of wrens building a nest in the new house!  The next step will be to enlarge the entry hole in the other bird house he built and see if we can attract another pair.

You can see both the unique design of the house as well as the over-sized piece of grass sticking out of the entry hole in the photo below.  Click on either photo to get an enlarged view.

Unfortunately, the entry hole faces out into the back yard and I probably won't be able to get photos of the nest or babies because the porch is fairly high off the ground and because of the angle needed to photograph it.  Maybe I can find a tall enough step ladder to put me on level with the birdhouse and use the zoom lens to get photos - we'll see what I can do.

This is sort of anti-climatic but I did finish the Cecropia Moth painting or at least I'm pretty sure it's finished.  It's a painting I even like for a change too - well, mostly like - there are always things that could be improved!  Will post a photo once the shine dries enough not to get glare.

Wren House

Yesterday a pair of Carolina Wrens tried to build a nest in the ceiling fan on our covered back porch.  We use the fan a lot and even if the fan isn't on, we also use the light in the fan as a porch light.  Not a good situation for baby wrens (or even the adults!)  My DH removed the nests before they got too far along in construction but Carolina Wrens are my favorite bird and I liked the idea of them nesting on the porch.

So I searched the internet for plans for a house that the birds could use and my husband built it as quickly as he could.  We hung it yesterday late afternoon/evening and are waiting to see if we have any new tenants.  I'll paint the house and decorate the outside if the pair of birds have decided to look elsewhere for a nesting site but didn't want to take the time to do it yesterday.  I wanted the birds to have the house as soon as possible if they were still looking for a place.

I also found plans for other wren houses that we may build and put up on the other side of the house.  I just liked this particular design because it hangs, is appealing to humans in shape and the entrance hole is sort of a keyhole shape.  This is supposed to enable the wrens to take in nesting material yet still keep the hole small enough to keep out sparrows or other undesirable birds who may want to use the house.

So far we haven't had any interested couples but I didn't get around to putting out a Welcome mat either!  Maybe i ought to go do that now and hope for occupants soon.