Front-row Seat

A pair of cardinals nested right outside my kitchen window this summer. I didn’t notice until just shortly before the eggs hatched. I give that mother cardinal credit. She sat on the nest through rain storm after rain storm in August. It must have been miserable. From inside the house, I could see the nest if I leaned way over the kitchen sink and and tilted my head at an uncomfortable angle under the knick knack shelf. The nest was slightly above my vantage point so even when the mother cardinal would leave the nest, I couldn’t see how many eggs she had.

Once the eggs hatched, it got a lot noisier out the kitchen window with babies peeping and parents scolding other critters that came too close. A few times I witnessed the father cardinal bringing food to the family. When the baby birds were done with their meal, mother cardinal would fluff out her feathers and wiggle back and forth over the open beaks until she smushed them down into the nest. More than anything, she probably just wanted some peace and quiet! As the days passed, the mother cardinal often joined the father to find food for the hatchlings, leaving a nest of cheaping beaks behind. I counted three.

A few days later I was in the kitchen getting a drink of water and craned my head to check on the family. I was startled by a Sharp-shinned hawk sitting inches above the nest. I pounded on the window and screamed and took off for the screen porch. The door was stuck from all the humid weather and when I finally shoved it open and jumped out, I slipped on the wet rocks below, smacking my arm hard on the ground.

I scrambled up and ran around the corner yelling and flailing my one good arm. The hawk flew away. I got as close to the nest as I could, but it was impossible to see if anything was still inside. All of the backyard creatures like chipmunks, squirrels and other birds were cawing, scolding, chipping and cheaping. I backed away from the nest and stood still in the drizzle for a few moments to see if there was any sign of life. I heard a sharp “chip” call and spotted the male cardinal in a nearby shrub. A few moments later the female appeared. Well, at least the hawk didn’t get either of them. I didn’t want to terrorize them any more than the hawk did, so I went back inside the house.

By crawling onto the ledge of the kitchen sink, I could just barely see inside the nest. There was at least one little gray body heaving up and down. I didn’t know if he was still taking cover or if he was injured. I didn’t want to think about it. Then I was concerned that even if the babies did survive that the mother wouldn’t want to come back to the nest since the hawk certainly knew their address. I wasn’t relishing the idea of having starving, abandoned babies outside of my kitchen window.

As the afternoon wore on, I became obsessive-compulsive about checking the nest. I’m sure the neighbors were quite entertained by the nutcase running outside every 15 minutes in the rain to scour the trees. When I wasn’t outside putting on a show for the neighbors, I was inside contorted over the kitchen sink. The mother cardinal returned to the nest about 90 minutes after the incident. She didn’t stay very long, but I was encouraged that she came back at all. The next day she seemed to be back to her normal routine. I had no idea if she was sitting on live babies, so I peered out the window from time to time to see if any hungry beaks would appear. Sure enough, the father cardinal arrived with food in the evening and two little heads popped up. That meant the hawk was indeed able to snatch one of the three babies before I put the crazy on him. I’m still surprised that he never came back to finish the job.

The following week I noticed that one of the youngsters wouldn’t sit in the nest anymore. He preferred to stand on the edge, wobbling back and forth. Soon his brother was doing the same. As they got more confident they would to hop from the nest to some branches and back again. Two days later the big moment came and they left the nest for good with a nervous mother in tow. What a relief! I could go back to normal birdwatching (no flailing, no scouring the trees). A chipmunk thought the nest was a pretty nifty place to store acorns and filled it up to the top. And I see the young birds almost every day when their mother brings them to my feeders for a snack.