I had the unique pleasure on the afternoon of June 4th to observe the courtship ritual of a pair of vermilion flycatchers. I'd never seen anything like that before and I probably will never have the opportunity to see it again. They would take turns coming to one branch on an oak tree....they'd sit there and sort of squiggle around, ruffle their feathers and then fly off. The male would take off, flying straight up in the air, with his wings fluttering just as fast as they would go while he was singing his heart out! After about 20 minutes of this, they both flew off.

The next day I decided to check out that limb they'd been taking turns sitting on the day before. Lo and behold, there was a nest there that the mama had built in a day's time!

Next day there was one egg.

Next day there were two eggs.

Next day there were four eggs....oh no, how can there be four eggs since she can only lay one a day?? Well, one of them was obviously not the same as the three that the flycatcher had laid since it was somewhat larger and also a different color. I suspect a cowbird had deposited an egg there hoping the flycatcher would raise a baby for her...that's what the cowbirds are famous for. I took that egg out!

On the morning of June 21st the babies were already hatched. It looked like they were at least a couple of days old which would have meant only about 11 days incubation period....much sooner than I'd anticipated and much sooner than the books say they should hatch. I was surprised at the color of their feathers....white and fuzzy. To me they looked like tiny skunks with the white down and the portions of their black bodies showing through!

This pair of flycatchers certainly helped to keep the "critter" population down since they brought the babies a wide variety of goodies from worms to flying bugs to grasshoppers. It was also interesting to note that when a large insect was caught in their beaks these birds would take them to the nearest fence post or something ...

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