Stitching the Tailor bird's nest

Oh yes, I did and I continue to do every time one more leaf becomes dry and detaches itself from the branch supporting the nest. As of now all the original leaves that were used to build the nest have turned completely brown and have broken off from the main branch.

The nest is being supported by the adjacent leaves I have used to stitch the nest to. Contrary to popular belief touching the nest doesn't make the mother leave the nest. Actually it seems to know me and even when I approach does not fly away unless I am real close to the nest.



You can actually see the brown thread I have used to stitch the leaves at the bottom right of the image.

Here is an old nest whose leaves have turned completely brown. I wonder if this nest raised a family. For Chaithu it was a nice item for his "show-and-tell" at school.


One more thing. All this time I had been mistaking the Common Tailorbird to be the Prinia. My sister-in-law was right. It is the common tailor bird and not the Prinia. I read on Wikipedia that it takes only 14 days to hatch the eggs but this one has been sitting on the eggs for almost 21 days.

Meanwhile a sunbird also tried to build a nest in my garden. The Sunbird, a relative of the bee-humming bird, makes loud noises at it constructs its nest. The nest is more sophisticated with a hood unlike the tailor bird's nest and it doesn't stitch any leaves but instead uses branches and twigs to suspend it's nest. But even before complete construction, the nest was ransacked, probably by some predator. The nest was poorly concealed.

Heavy engineering

I am amazed at some of the nests that the crows build during their nesting season. I found two near our colony who have built them on power line posts. One of them on a high tension one as this. I wonder how the crow placed its first sticks to lay the foundation and that too with just a beak and two legs. Incredible!



And here's another one I found located on another electric post. Inside this one the mother was sitting on her eggs.



Now here's some trivia. I also believe the nests are a natural turn on for the Asiatic Koels and as evolution or survival of the species would have it they court, mate and the females go depositing their eggs in these crow nests. How perfect nature is.