In The Nest

Nick spent the morning

sanding down yesterday’s filling of walls, ceilings, and woodwork;

painting ceilings

and, this afternoon, walls

The blackbird’s nest, first sighted on 3rd June, now has,

as photographed by Jackie, two babies. One egg may be unhatched; the yellow ball is a seed.

For much of the day I listened to BBC’s sound broadcast of the last day of the second cricket Test match between England and New Zealand. Anyone who knows what happened will understand why.

This evening we dined on spare ribs in a variety of sauces, mine being chilli; Jackie’s flavoursome savoury rice, and tender runner beans, followed by strawberries and cream. The Culinary Queen drank Hoegaarden, Becky drank Portuguese Rosé, Ian drank Cobra and I drank Calvet Prestige Côtes du Rhône Villages 2020. Flo abstained.

72 comments

  1. Interior shots of active nests tend to be hard to come by. Congrats to Jackie for this interesting look into Blackbird’s life. Glad to see Nick’s work ongoing. He does do good work…

      1. As a pre teen I read everything I could find about the Surrey glory years while enjoying Hampshire’s glory years. The idea of listening to Laker’s wickets would have been a boyhood dream. I’m now seriously jealous of you….

  2. Nick does fine work! Glad to see him using a respirator while sanding, protecting his lungs.

    I will enjoy watching the baby birds grow. Thank you, Jackie and Derrick, for documenting their journey.

  3. I find its a bonus to actually find a nest in the garden and am impressed that Jackie managed to get a peep inside it!

  4. I imagine Nick’s muscles get sore! I bet he sleeps soundly at night with all of the great work he does!
    Oh, Jackie! Thank you for letting us get a peek at the birdie-babies! So sweet!
    And, Derrick, thank you, again, for sparking a good memory for me and for letting me link your post and photo in my latest post.
    One of my joys in life has been having birds nest in our yards and trees…and getting a front row seat to watch as the bird parents build the nest, care for the eggs, and the babies, etc.! 🙂
    One time we got to watch a mom and dad quail as they helped their babies fly up and over the wall when they were finally old enough! What a thrill to watch them go off into the big world! And a joy to provide a safe place for them to get their babies raised to that stage of their lives. 🙂
    (((HUGS))) 🙂 ❤️

  5. Whatever happened to those cheery robins who used to nest in your garden? Did they all fly away?

  6. A great shot of the nest. We have another pair of lovey doves in one of our hanging plants. The first set grew up to be teenagers and is long gone. Only time will tell with these newbies.

  7. At the moment we have cardinals and mourning doves each with a nest in our grape arbor–several feet apart. Sadly they are above my head, so I won’t get any photos. I do like watching the nest cams on line to watch hawks. I had never seen blackbirds in a nest. THanks.

  8. Before you know it, those babies will flege/fledge (spellcheck doesn’t like either spelling!). Anyway, those baby birds grow so fast! Great nest picture, {{{Derrick}}}.

  9. Ugh, ceilings. My neck hurt from memories as I looked at your photos of Nick painting. Ceilings are the worst. He has done a beautiful job of prepping though. After the basecoat one can’t even detect all the repairs that were done.

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