Thursday, February 17, 2011

What is it?


MARCH 9 UPDATE BELOW!



I found this gem in the most unlikely place. Can you guess where?




This graceful little nest hangs just above the ground beside a path in the local woods.





(click for larger image)
It was perhaps a foot off the ground and was pendulous like an oriole nest. It was approximately 5 inches long and at the widest part, maybe 3 inches. Any ideas as to who built it?


March 9 UPDATE:
NEAT! Tom from Ask a Naturalist.com has solved the mystery! He consulted two experts and the consensus is red-winged black bird. An oriole nest is also a possibility. Thank you Tom!

EARLIER UPDATE:
My friend, Jonna, suggested perhaps, that the nest belongs to a Red-eyed Vireo! This from a site called Familiar Birds of America:
"Nesting.--The red-eyed vireo builds a dainty little pensile nest suspended usually from a forking, horizontal branch of a shrub, or low branch of a tree, rather below the level of our eyes as we walk through second-growth. The nest is a beautifully finished piece of workmanship, constructed of fine grasses and rootlets, bits of birch bark, and paper from wasps' nests, bound together and to the supporting branches with spider's or caterpillar's webbing, and, perhaps the most constant material, long, narrow, flexible strands of grapevine bark, which help to hold up the cup of the nest. It may be ornamented on the outside with bits of lichen. Dr. Arthur A. Allen (1932) says that it has thinner walls usually than other vireo's nests."

8 comments:

Lynne at Hasty Brook said...

How pretty! It's like a pouch full of gems.
I think there are mice that make nests like that.

Cathy said...

Sweet Lynne!

I never even gave a thought to mice!
Oh my gosh. Now I've got to do some research.
How cute is that!?

threecollie said...

No clue but it is pretty neat.

julie said...

I'd have to guess an Easter bunny...
;)

Linda said...

I'd have never of guessed from the first pic!

Cathy said...

Three Collie -

I've not given up! We will have an answer. (Even if I have to make one up:-)

Julie -

Awwwww . . Now THAT is the best guess ever. You're little boy is lucky to have a mom who knows about Easter bunny nests.


Linda -

I know! Is that cool or what? You can imagine my delight when I peered down in there.

Cathy said...

Julie.

As you know . . . it's 'your' not 'you're'.

I hates it when I do that.

Ambrose said...

cholesterol levels

san antonio nightlife

how much is breast augmentation

hot yoga calgary

Belleville Ontario

1200 calorie diets

fall fashion 2011

Toronto homes

short term loans

los angeles restaurants