By Alice Martin

Friends of a Feather

The quintessential American Robin is a familiar sight to all of us.  Once they arrive in the early spring, and such a welcome sight that is, you will commonly see them in your yard hopping around, foraging for food and often tugging earthworms out of the ground. You will notice that sometimes a robin stands still, tipping its head toward the ground like it is listening for worms. It is.  

Believe it or not, worms create a slight vibration as they move through the ground and the robins have evolved to be sensitive to this specific sound.  Robins will come to feeders occasionally and, this spring, I had one actually eating grape jelly at the oriole feeder.  Their warm red/orange breast and cheery song contribute to them being one of the first birds recognized by young children.  

Like most other migratory birds, robins don’t usually remain with one mate, taking on a new one each spring. During breeding season, the male robin puts on quite a show with strutting courtship displays.  He also belts out melodious tunes at dawn, shakes his wings, fluffs his tail feathers and puffs his white-striped throat to entice the lady robins. 

Once a match is made. the male robin brings nest building materials, like grass, twigs and mud, to the female.  She builds an open nest about 5-8 inches across and 3-6 inches high which is reinforced with mud and built on a mud base.  A very sturdy nest!  The female typically lays only one bright blue egg a day for three or four days.  The eggs are incubated strictly by the female but the male plays an important role feeding the female and protecting the nest. The incubation period begins after the last egg is laid and the eggs hatch in about two weeks.  After another two weeks, the baby robins are ready to leave the nest, but even after they leave, the parent robins take care of them for at least another week.  

Being highly territorial, the male robin will make his presence known during the incubation period and do his best to repel any perceived danger.  A couple of summers ago, I was repeatedly dive-bombed by a resident robin and was not very happy when it chased away the first Orchard Oriole that I had ever had in my yard.  In fact, the first one I had ever seen, period.  The Orchard Oriole was somewhat persistent, but the robin out-persisted, so to speak, and the Orchard Oriole was not to be seen again.  

If you find a nestling robin on the ground, that is, one that is featherless and unable to stand, and you can locate the nest from which it fell, you may gently return it to the nest.  If you can’t find or reach the nest, you can actually fashion a little nest from grass and twigs and place it in a sheltered spot.  The parent birds may find it and continue to care for it.  According to the National Audubon Society, it is a myth that the parent robins will abandon the nest because of a human scent.  If the baby robin you find is a fledgling, that is fully feathered and hopping around but unable to fly well, it’s likely learning to fly and its parents are nearby, so leave it alone.   

Do not keep a baby robin thinking that you can raise it.  It’s virtually impossible for a human to fill in for the parent birds.  The parent robin might make 100 feeding visits to the nest each day and each nestling may eat up to 14 feet of earthworms during its two weeks of life in the nest…and that’s not the only thing they eat.   Furthermore, keeping the baby bird, even temporarily, is against the law as set out in the Federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918.  Granted, if you do keep the bird, it is pretty unlikely that you’ll be caught and prosecuted, but unfortunately, the bird probably will not survive anyway. 

Have you ever seen a Robin in the winter?  Some, depending upon conditions, will spend the whole winter in their breeding range, but you’re much less likely to see them because they spend most of their time roosting in the trees and less time in your yard.  They change their diet to fruits, and you my occasionally see a “tipsy” robin thanks to it consuming some fermented fruit.  Personally, I have never seen a Robin in the winter but have had friends call me exclaiming in disbelief that they thought they had seen one albeit in January.

‘Til next time, happy birding to you.