Mother Nature can be Cruel
I generally do not feed meal worms to bluebirds. But when the weather does not cooperate with a nesting pair of bluebirds I will offer meal worms, blueberries and boiled raisins. Mother Nature provided a few weeks of warm dry weather in South Western Pennsylvania in the Month of April and a pair of bluebirds started to nest and have young in early May and then things got cold. It stayed cold and wet for the whole Month on May. I kept a close watch on the pair of bluebirds as they tried desperately to feed their young but I knew it was just too cold for insects to be active. I purchased meal worms locally at a bait store to hold them over until I ordered them on line. The pair of bluebirds were starving and so were the nestlings. I attached a small plastic bowl of meal worms on the pole of the nest box to make it more noticeable for them. As I walk away the male bluebird darted down and started eating. He ate most of the meal worms himself and soon he was taking some into the nest box. The female never left the box because it was just to cold for the new born nestling’s. The five nestlings fledged on June 8th 2008 and the pair of bluebirds is now building their second nest at my home box. On my trail boxes I lost many nestlings due to the cold and wet weather. Mother Nature can be cruel with the unpredictable weather she can hand out.
