Nesting Chronicles — May 20

May 21, 2026May 20, 2026 / The Urban Nature Enthusiast / 3 Comments

It’s an especially tense time on Nest Watch at the moment.

Some local crows are getting close to having fledglings leave the nest, while others, having lost the first nest, are starting all over again, searching for twigs and moss to rebuild in another location.

Overhead, the local bald eagles and hawks are hunting, pursued by groups of furious crows. These are particularly scary times for the crows with nests located in high spots!

There is so much nesting news, I’ll have to limit this update to just a few of the local crow families, with more dispatches later.

Today, I’ll tell you how things are going for Marvin and Mavis, Norman and Nancy and Sneezy and Sue. All of these crow pairs are still at their first nests of the season and tantalizingly close to having fledglings fledge!

Marvin and Mavis

Marvin and Mavis are playing their nesting cards close to their feathery chests.

You got to know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em
Know when to walk away and know when to run
You never count your hatchlings when you’re sittin’ on the wee nest
There’ll be time enough for countin’ when the fledgin’s done

— With apologies to Kenny Rogers

Despite visiting them at least twice a day, I still can’t tell for sure where they’ve built their nest — although I’m beginning to have my suspicions. That they DO have a nest is certain, as Mavis is mostly absent, appearing in the open only occasionally to stretch luxuriously and preen her nest-cramped feathers.

Marvin seemed to have a lot of white on his beak the other day — a sign that the eggs have hatched. A little sidebar here on the significance of White Beak Day, as featured in the 2026 City Crow Calendar:

WHITE BEAK DAY is the first day of the nesting season when crow parents appear with white stuff on their beak. That white material is fecal matter from their hatchlings. Sounds a bit yuck, but it’s all part of Nature’s amazing design.

Once the eggs are hatched, the nest is full of tiny pooping baby birds. It’s critical to keep the nest as clean and bacteria-free as possible, and Mother Nature provides fecal sacs for this purpose. While disposable diapers are not available for birds, the hatchlings do excrete into handy sacs of mucous membrane, which the parents can carefully remove from the nest.

When the hatchlings are very young, their digestive systems are not yet fully developed, so their droppings are nutrient-rich so, with a practical “waste not want not” philosophy, the crow parents will often consume the sacs. Sometimes they burst — hence the white on the parental beaks.

It’s a happy day as it means that eggs have hatched successfully and the crow family is one step closer to a successful nesting season. Today I saw Earl, Norman and Sue with white on their beaks!

Marvin with tell-tale white marks on his beak.

I haven’t seen Lou (their fledgling from last year who stayed with them all winter) for the past couple of weeks. It’s too early to tell if his absence is temporary or if Mom and Dad have told him it’s time to move on and be an independent young crow.

Below: Marvin in fully-fluffed fierce guard mode. Smart, yet casual.

Norman and Nancy

I’m really hoping for success for these two as they embark upon their fourth nesting season with no fledglings to show for their efforts to date.

Norman and Nancy earn top marks for an early start this year, but their site selection is somewhat risky. They chose to use the same tree they’ve used in previous years, where they lost the nest to raccoons at least twice. This time, they’ve built near the top of the tree, reducing the raccoon risk, but putting them closer to the “eagle zone.”

A bedraggled Nancy leaves the nest for a well-earned swish and shake break.

However, judging by the questionable items I’ve had to fish out of our bird bath over the past couple of weeks, and the white on their beaks, I think Nancy and Norm are currently feeding some fledglings up there. They like to pre-soak food for the babies to keep them hydrated and fed in one go.

It seems that the menu over at Norman and Nancy’s is rodent-forward. While this good for rat population control, I am a bit tired of disinfecting the bird bath after fishing out soggy rodent-remnants. I’m now trying to divert their food prep efforts from the bird bath to a simple plastic bowl of water that’s easier to clean a few times a day.

I’m keeping all my fingers and toes crossed that we’ll see some little Normans and Nancies (is that the plural of Nancy??) soon.

Norman cawing at a gull that flew too close to the nest this morning.

Sneezy and Sue

For a young couple, Sneezy and Sue are doing well on the nesting front. They seem to have stayed roughly in the territory they claimed last spring when Bongo and Bella opted to move out of the cat-inhabited territory. Luckily, the cat seems to have gone now. I think Bongo and Bella would like to reclaim that part of the block, but Sneezy and Sue are settled in now, and having none of it.

Like Norman and Nancy, Sneezy and Sue built their nest early and they chose a well camouflaged spot in a dark-leafed tree. They’ve maintained a very low profile for weeks now, with Sue emerging from the nest over the past couple of weeks, suitably adorned with the white streaks of parental success.

Young Syd, Sneezy and Sue’s fledgling from last year, is around intermittently and helping to guard the nest.

Let’s hope that the nesting luck holds for this trio of crow families for the next few crucial weeks.

In my next post, I’ll let you know how things are going for Bill and Irene and their neighbours, Earl and Echo.

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Nesting News

May 14, 2026May 14, 2026 / The Urban Nature Enthusiast / 2 Comments

Nesting season is fully underway once again, and, as usual, things are going more smoothly for some crows than for others.

My next post will give a rundown on how individual crows are doing, but today I’m thinking about the general crow strategies for a successful nesting season.

This pivotal period requires some serious tactical thinking — decisions made at the outset of nest-building have big downstream consequences.

For example, when to build the nest?

With hotter, drier summers becoming the new normal, the impetus is to get started as soon as possible. Fledgling-rearing in drought conditions is really difficult and lowers the survival rate considerably.

An early start is, therefore, the obvious way to go — but there are downsides!

Any early-built nest is often in a deciduous tree that isn’t fully leafed out, allowing potential predators to observe and memorize the location.

This year, we’ve already had a lot of hot, dry weather in Vancouver, so I’ve been putting bowls of water out to help the crows keep themselves and their fledglings hydrated. It has just rained, so we’re back to normal spring weather with puddles-a-plenty — for now.

Many of the early nests will fail for one reason or another, forcing some crows to hustle to get a second nest built. This will mean they’ll be forced to raise the fledglings in the hotter, drier weather, but they’ll usually take that chance.

Where to build the nest?

Even once a site is picked, there’s the question of whether to build higher or lower. Height offers relative safety from ground-based dangers like cats, raccoons and coyotes, but puts the nest in the hunting zone for eagles, hawks, owls and ravens.

So many risk/benefit scenarios and lessons learned in previous years are being processed by our local crow parents.

Each couple will take many factors, far beyond mere nest altitude, into consideration before deciding where to build. Good nest sites are highly sought after, and territorial lines between crow families may be fought over and altered at this time of year.

Real estate in the city is a competitive commodity, for people AND crows.

Crow families generally have a half block or so of territory, which they will defend against other crows and, in winter, they will spend most of their daylight hours there before heading to the roost at night. Once a nest is built and has eggs in it, the crow parents will forgo the nightly roost trip to guard the nest and, later, the fledglings, 24/7.

Crow couples prefer to nest in the same territory, year after year — but things in the city are always in flux, for people and for wildlife — and sometimes a change of scene is essential if something in the neighbourhood changes to make it less safe or desirable.

The most spectacular example of this was Marvin and Mavis’s forced last-minute move in 2021 when the nearby stand of trees they’d nested in for years was felled for a new development.

Last Spring, Bongo and Bella had to abandon their first nest due to the addition of a particularly ferocious outdoor cat to the local community. They moved their nest location out of their usual territory, forcing them to fight for space with crow neighbours to the south. Meanwhile, the territory they left vacant was snapped up by a more junior couple. Sometimes you have to put up with a less-than-ideal starter home when you’re just starting out, even if it comes with a terrifying tree-climbing cat.

Even after nesting season, the territorial lines have remained permanently redrawn.

Another example: this season, I noticed a Cooper’s Hawk nesting in some big trees that are usually prime crow breeding spots. Some of the more senior crow families have always nested there. Now, suddenly, that particular area is much less sought after, and the only crow pair I see nesting nearby are a very young couple.

Nervous young dad

Crow trying to chase a hawk away from the nest

Their prospects are not great; aside from the predatory neighbours, this young pair are clearly inexperienced. The male, who looks very young and nervous, has not gotten the hang of bringing food to his mate as she sits on the nest, resulting in lots of loud (hawk-attracting) begging on her part, and frequent trips out of the nest to get her own snacks, when she should be sitting quietly and incubating the eggs. The odds seem pretty stacked against this young couple, but you never know …

The young crow pair that took over Bongo and Bella’s cat-scourged territory last year did succeed in raising fledglings. They were Sneezy and Sue, and one of the fledglings, Syd, is still with them — helping to defend their new territory.

Which brings me to perhaps the biggest factor in nest success or failure — sheer luck!

My next post will give a rundown on how my local crows are doing as individual families. We’ll see how Marvin & Mavis, Norman and Nancy, Bill and Irene and the rest are doing, and whether the nest gods are smiling or frowning on their efforts so far.

Sounds of Springtime

April 18, 2023 / The Urban Nature Enthusiast / 5 Comments

It can be a bit confusing to hear the sounds of fledgling crows begging loudly for food as early as April.

We’re still weeks away from the excitement of the first fledgling appearances — so what’s going on?

You’re hearing the sound of female crows begging food from their mates. They sound just like hungry fledglings and also adopt the classic begging pose — wings out, head lowered.

It’s just another part of the nesting dance. The construction of the nest is probably complete and the female is getting ready to lay eggs, but first she needs to remind her mate that she, just like the helpless fledgling she’s mimicking, is going to be relying on him for food soon.

The Walkers have been displaying this behaviour for a week or so now.

Mr Walker feeding his mate, Wanda

Shortly before laying eggs the female crow loses feathers on a patch of her underside so that her body heat will pass to the eggs without any feathery insulation getting in the way. This is called a brood patch — and only the mother crow has one — so for two to three weeks it’s her job to sit on the nest and incubate the precious eggs, while her mate is responsible for guarding the nest and keeping her fed. If he fails, she will be brooding in more way than one …

Wanda (blind in one eye) in a cherry tree

Wanda is starting to insist that Mr. Walker feed her, even when she’s got a beak full of food already, just to jog his crow brain into remembering his coming duties.

Mr. Walker, dependable father to be

Here’s a little phone video series of the current daily routine.

Part one: As always, Mr. Walker dashes along beside us. At the moment his route is decorated with drifts of pink snow from fallen cherry blossom petals.

Part two: As usual, Wanda arrives at the peanut destination first (having come via air travel) and gets first dibs on the snacks.

Part three: in spite of having more than her share of peanuts, Wanda insists that Mr. W feeds her some of his. He gallantly obliges.

The Walkers at Home

Let’s hope the Walkers have a successful season. Like many of the local crows, their 2022 nesting efforts went unrewarded, so a couple of new little Walkers this year would be extra nice.

Junior Walkers 2021

Mr Walker, reporting for parental duty