Busy, Busy House Wren

There is much activity around our house these days, and it's not just of the human kind. Gardening, landscaping, general after-winter clean up and the start of the art fair season have got us hopping. But the birds are busy too, staking their claim to tree and nest box. Among the most vocal of these is the house wren. The name-sake of my blog, (although my header shows a Carolina wren), I adore this little bird. It's a good thing, because we have three of them staking claims over three of our five nest boxes.

Walking the dogs the other day I came across a male who had a female visitor checking out his digs. He flew in with twigs while she chattered and hopped around. I went back out with my camera a short while later but she was gone, leaving him to sing and dash about from branch to branch. He eventually settled down with an ant snack.

House wren with ant.

I  moved around to the front of the house where another wren was busy stocking his next box with twigs.

He was tireless, bringing stick after stick and shoving them into the opening.

He seems to have a bit of an issue with spacial relations....

I was impressed with his energy.

I sat and watched him for 10 minutes or so, then went back to work myself.

From the Backyard

The heat wave has finally passed here in SE Michigan, and I spent the morning a few days back out playing with my new lens. I had found a patch of milkweed the day before with monarch caterpillars busily munching away. I'll be keeping an eye on this bunch!



Note the frass, or caterpillar poop, on the leaf by their heads.


This adult monarch was sunning itself in an autumn olive.


We planted five big bluestem plants last year at the top of a small rise near some black cherry trees as an experiment to see how they'd do. I was thrilled to see them blooming, and plan on clearing some of the ground around these plants in the hopes that they will self-sow. This native grass grows to over seven feet tall--these were around six.

After four years of not mowing every inch of the property as the previous owners had, some native plants are starting to return.

Hairy bush clover,

round-headed bush clover,

and slender bush clover have all cropped up.


Thanks, Julie Zickafoose, for your timely post of a link to a great pdf of Ohio's dragonflies and damselflies! This is a spreadwing damselfly, though not sure whether southern or northern.


This amazing spiderweb glowed in the morning sun.


And the wren rambles on.