The Bluebird Bonanza at Wolgast Tree Farm

Among our most favorite species of birds seen here at Wolgast Tree Farm are Eastern Bluebirds.  Their gentleness, heavenly color and soothing song guarantees a smile.

It’s been a banner year for nesting bluebirds on the farm.  We’ve seen bluebirds foraging around our Christmas trees that have fledged this spring, and have at least two other nest boxes with nestling bluebirds that are getting close to fledging.  Just yesterday we saw another female bluebird bring nesting materials into another nest box.  Bluebirds usually produce two broods of young, though sometimes they’ll produce as many as three in a nesting season.

Although a variety of bird species will build nests tucked in the branches of our Christmas trees, bluebirds are one species that doesn’t.  They are known as cavity nesters and build their nest in an enclosed structure like a wooden fence post or tree with a hole that had been excavated by another bird species (like woodpeckers), or in nestboxes created by people.   We’ve put up at least ten bluebird nest boxes on the farm like this one.  They are used by bluebirds, as well as American tree swallows, tufted titmice, Carolina chickadees, and house wrens. 

Bluebirds usually build their nests by weaving together grasses or pine needles.  Most of the bluebird nests on the farm are made with needles from the white pines that we grow.   It feels good to not only give bluebirds housing by putting up nestboxes, but to provide the “furnishings” by growing Christmas trees.

Here’s a look inside one of the bluebird nest boxes that we put up on our Christmas tree farm.  Because the birds are snuggled close together in the nest it may be hard to count, but there are four nestlings in this box.  These birds will fledge in less than two weeks, and then spend the rest of the summer flying among our Christmas trees, eating insects and berries, and charming us with their sweet song.

PS. Learn more about Eastern bluebirds by visiting the Cornell Lab of Ornithology at http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Eastern_Bluebird/lifehistory#top .