Bluebirds!

We have bluebirds!

And because we have technology that the Austens did not have in 1800, we can reassure ourselves that the evil house sparrow emperor has not captured the throne. We witnessed quite a battle between the house sparrows and the bluebirds, and I believe there might have been some swallows joining in, because the whole lot of them flew high up over the house and disappeared, to carry out their battle somewhere else. Possibly they disliked hearing the humans gasp in dismay as they fought more brutally than we would like to think possible for such beautiful, graceful creatures.

We did not see the outcome of the Big Battle, but we had moved our wildlife camera to a location near the birdhouse we had set up for them, and we saw several days later that indeed, the bluebirds had prevailed.

 

Eastern bluebirds appear to be making a recovery; at one time they were endangered, thanks to house sparrows and other aggressive small birds that would take over their nesting places. They are a frequent sight in New England fields, but they are tiny and fly very fast, so capturing an image is very difficult.