The Carolina Wren is one of many birds we have in abundance at Fort Frederica.  During our recent closure, we found two Carolina Wren nests in odd places.

The first nest was in one of the golf carts.  These golf carts are parked under a shelter behind the Visitors Center.  We use them to give tours to people who are handicapped.  Once the park closed, an enterprising pair of Carolina Wrens built a next in the glove box.  Tom cleaned out the nest, but the next day there was a new nest.  We weren’t using the golf carts anyway, so we left the nest alone after that.

Another nesting pair put their nest in a bag of sand the park uses for various purposes.  Tom found the nest because he needed to use the sand to mix tabby.  But we didn’t want to disturb the nest, so he used another bag of coarser sand instead.  This nest was in direct sunlight, so one of our volunteers put a little tarp over it to provide some shade.

I walk by the second nest every day, so I often checked on it and spotted the mother Carolina Wren deep inside.  The nests are small but deep, and you could just make out the white eye stripe on the mom.  She would, of course, fly away if I got too close.  She didn’t make any noise though – only the male Carolina Wren chirps.

Finally the eggs hatched and mom had a job feeding her three babies.  I saw the babies several days in a row and got this picture (not very good) of them.  They were scrawny and barely had any coverings.  A couple days after they hatched the nest was empty.  I assume something got the babies because they were still much too young to fly.

I love to hear all the bird songs around Fort Frederica.  We have a huge variety of birds and the tiny Carolina Wren is one of my favorites.