Robin Watch Wrapup

I returned on Sunday to find that one of my four baby robins had left the nest. He/she fluttered away from the kennel fence as I approached from the car. Checking the nest I found that two of the remaining three were testing their wings. By the next morning, one of these was gone.

The remaining two just sat around for the next day, until this morning, Tuesday, when they finally left the nest. I can imagine mama and papa robin despairing that they were ever going to leave home, but, while keeping track of their nest, they also seemed to be feeding them sparingly. It seems they were waiting for them to figure out that they needed to fly away to find food.

Tuesday morning I found one of them out of the nest and perching on the beam. Soon this one was on the ground and the last of them was chirping anxiously as he/she watched the ground. "You come back here this minute." she seemed to say. Soon the last baby fluttered from the nest and in the next five to ten minutes both were gone, along with their doting parent who had been waiting nearby to escort them to safety. I can now open the back yard for my long suffering dogs, but I'm sure glad I had kept them confined while this was going on. Those babies did spend some time on the ground getting their bearings, and I'd have been horrified if my "kids" had gotten to them.

All is well - until the parents return and start this process again, which, if history is any predictor, they will do.