Common Blackbird Chick on Ground - feeding frenzy!

Common Blackbird chick on the ground! The 4 turdus merula chicks, or common blackbird young all fledged early, due to the hot weather. Two or three were hanging in. In the garden and you can see these chicks are still quite small. In a few days, they will almost be double this size! We see first the female blackbird, but she was gone and I have not seen her since. We have seen the male blackbird, but you see he was injured or at least had some strange loose feathers. But he looks fine again now.

The blackbird chicks were very hungry and calm on the ground. The father blackbird came time after time, collecting these little caterpillars or maggots that were falling from the sky! Talk about God feeding the birds with the manna from God! Nature is amazing! This male blackbird was even startled by the frantic cries from the young blackbird, demanding more food! He got fed maggot after maggot! See how useful birds are for the ecosystem around our houses?! They clean up what would otherwise turn into a stinking mess.

Now, this is the blackbirds FOURTH nest! They had THREE in the same place and this one in the larger tree in our garden was the FOURTH! This is very unusual, even for the moderate climate in The Netherlands! As we read,

“The young are fed by the parents for up to three weeks after leaving the nest, and will follow the adults begging for food. If the female starts another nest, the male alone will feed the fledged young. Second broods are common, with the female reusing the same nest if the brood was successful, and three broods may be raised in the south of the Common Blackbird's range.” Source: https://www.jungledragon.com/specie/8...

These blackbirds have it good. I hope the little blackbird survived, They left our garden the next day. I think I hear them a few gardens down and have seen father blackbird chasing away crows and what have you, so that is a positive sign! It is common for blackbird young to fledge and hang out on the ground. Although most of the little cute hatchlings I’ve seen fledge, end up in low branches of the bushes, those these chicks fell out of the nest early, but still no reason for alarm, as the blackbird parents are hard-working birds!

#blackbird #birds #nature

Common Blackbird Chick on Ground, in a feeding frenzy!