Need an experienced birder's help: cowbird egg ?

[Wingman]

MSDawg870 and I did warbler box inspections today at Sky Lake. We found 3 nests with eggs. I was super-happy to get the following photo and didn't notice anything on site. Then, after getting it on the computer, I'm kinda worried. Is the egg in the 9 o'clock position a brown headed cowbird egg? Slightly different color and it appears slightly larger. It looks just like an egg in another warbler nest that has only 1 egg. I looked up photos of cowbird eggs on the net and it looks a lot like one to me, but it is so close to the look of the prothontary egg.

If it's a cowbird egg, I'm gonna feed it to the turtles.

pwarbler nest finish.jpg

[MSDawg870]

I'm not an experienced birder, but I can google lwith the best of em.

Looks like dinner time for the turtles.

http://www.sciencefriday.com/news/030907/bird.jpg

[timberjack]

toss it.......worst case scenario it's a warbler egg but you've still got 6 left.

[Wingman]

I'm not an experienced birder, but I can google lwith the best of em.

Looks like dinner time for the turtles.

http://www.sciencefriday.com/news/030907/bird.jpg

Good pic. I looked at a dozen sites and didn't see that one. I think the nest with the one egg in it is also a BHCB egg.

[River Hunter]

Cowbirds are one of the few birds that will lay there eggs in another nest and let another bird raise there young. I can remember my father telling me this some time ago. I believe this is right anyone els heard this?

[Deadeye]

I had a little warbler build a nest on the manifold of my tractor, behind the fuel filters... 5 eggs in it. I felt terrible for having to remove it but I had to use the tractor. Anyway, I was careful extracting the nest hoping to return it in tact after I was finsihed and noticed something very strange in the bottom of the nest... she had lined the entire "softspot" of the nest with shedded snake skin. It appeared to be a good size snake by looking at the belly scales.. that's the first time I've ever seen that.

I have a yellow lab that sheds something fierce.. every bird nest in my neighborhood is lined with his hair....

Deadeye

[4dawgma]

Cowbirds are one of the few birds that will lay there eggs in another nest and let another bird raise there young. I can remember my father telling me this some time ago. I believe this is right anyone els heard this?

This is true. They are called cow birds but from my understanding a better name may be buffalo birds. At one time they would follow migrating buffalo feeding in their disturbed areas. This nomadic lifestyle didn't leave much time for raising young. Their range has changed over the past few centuries since the buffalo no longer roam the West freely. They prefer the nests of smaller birds whose young are quickly outgrown by the cow bird and either starved or tossed out of the nest. I prefer a .17 HMR for their pesky little arses with 10 points for the male and 50 points for the females

[jacksbuddy]

I'm not an experienced birder, but I can google lwith the best of em.

Looks like dinner time for the turtles.

http://www.sciencefriday.com/news/030907/bird.jpg

According to this picture, toss it. And do so quickly.

[jdbuckshot]

why toss it to the turtles, Toss that baby in a frying pan. ive only eaten chicken eggs, but eggs gotta be eggs right?

[Wingman]

Okay, I've done more research. In a study done with warbler nests parasitized by cowbirds, tossing the egg caused the female cowbird to ransack the host nest, apparently in retaliation. It appears that prothonotary warblers are real pushovers and are forced to raise the cowbird young at the expense of their own. The cowbirds hatch a few days earlier, open their eyes earlier and get bigger, quicker, than the baby warblers. Pretty clever, that ole cowbird.

It appears that tossing the eggs then restricting the entrance hole size to let the warblers in and keep the cowbirds out, is the only option. The prothonotary can fit through a 1 1/4" hole, but the cowbird cannot, I don't think. I'll have to measure my entrance holes and put a restrictor plate on there if they are too big.

Fortunately, MS law allows one to "control" brown headed cowbirds, among other blackbird types and the English House Sparrow, when they are depradating crops or intefering with other wildlife. Up until now, I've only had House Sparrows (HOSP) and European Starlings (EUST) on my hit list. Looks like there's a #3 now.

[Bercy]

What's wrong with house sparrows?

[MSDawg870]

What's wrong with house sparrows?

They're a non-native species and they compete with other native birds.

[messed up]

While yall are on the egg subject a friend of mine found a turkey nest with 21 egg's in it that he could count without messing with them. 21 egg's sound like a bunch to me, is that a normal #?

[duck_nutt]

sounds like too many to me.....

[Wingman]

Bercy, house sparrows and starlings will build their nests on top of baby songbirds, they'll go into the nest, kill the parents (like into a martin house) and the babies, or just fly off with the eggs and drop them in a field. They are a non-native species, much like asian carp, fire ants, etc. Thus, they are not protected by the MBTA and you can legally control them.

I've trapped and shot about 65 adult house sparrows this spring and almost 20 adult starlings. They love the grain bins and farm buildings here at the house. Getting really easy to keep them out of my martin houses now. They'll depredate bluebirds, too. The HOSP's are really aggressive, especially the male, and will defend their territory and/or oust a native bird from his nest so that the HOSP can make a nest.

Get rid of McDonald's french fries and the city HOSP would die. The English House Sparrow is not to be confused with our dozens of other native sparrows.