Return of the wrens, with bonus beauty

Kinda glad I was wrong about the wrens. 

A week or so ago I went out to fetch the weed-whacker from the recycling shed but found that Carolina wrens had built a nest in the battery compartment and tucked into the nest were five tiny eggs. So I left it alone. Weed-whacking could wait. 

Around mid-week when I checked on the nest, the eggs were gone and I didn't see any baby wrens--just a smear of dark fuzz. I wondered whether wrens would relocate eggs if a nest felt unsafe, but I feared that predators had found the eggs. Either way, I was resolved to catch up on the weed-whacking on the first dry morning.

That was today. Once again I went out to the recycling shed all kitted out in my weed-whacking gear--earplugs, eye protection, water bottle, battery, extra spools of weed-whacker line--but when I looked in the nest, that little smear of fuzz started wiggling.

I don't know how many nestlings survived but I saw at least two. Again, I left them alone and went to get the resident strongman to start up the gas-powered weed-whacker, which is heavier than mine and much more unwieldy and eventually made my upper arms feel like wet spaghetti, but never mind that: the whole time I was weed-whacking, I kept thinking about those baby wrens.

We've heard the adult wrens calling nearby and seen them perched on deck railings near the recycling shed, so I resolved to sit out there with the camera until I could catch a photo of the wrens tending their young. It's not possible to get photos of the nest itself because it's tucked too far back into the dark shed, but I sat for a very long time in the quiet afternoon trying to catch a glimpse of the adults wrens.

I don't know how long I was out there sitting as still as possible on the deck. I heard buzzes and chirps from many birds and a wood thrush calling invisibly in the woods, and from down near the creek came the sound of a deer huffing and snorting. Maybe my presence spooked the wrens because they didn't show up for a long while, but then I saw one calling from a pine bough and then scavenging for bugs in the tulip poplar right next to the deck and then calling and calling and calling from trees along the edge of the yard. When a wren finally approached the nest, it swooped in low so that I barely saw it--but I heard the faint cheeping of the nestlings in response.

The photos are from too far away to be sharp, but I know the wrens will be more comfortable tending to their young if I'm not around, so I went inside.  And now I look out my front window and see a flash of color in the dogwood tree just outside the window--an oriole! Some days I'm so surrounded by beauty I don't even know where to look.