I guess Allen and I are not the only ones that think the valley is a good place to build a home. I have been finding tons of nests of all kinds lately right around the house. When I was clearing back behind the house last week I spied this little nest. I wondered if it is a hummingbird nest? Someone of more authority would have to tell me; I don't know much about such things. The curious part is that it was built about 3 feet off the ground in a little baby tree. I thought this was awful close to the ground because of predators and such.
You can see here how small it is. It is about the same height as the diameter. I loved how the outside was kind of flowing and loose and the inside was so tight and precise. Excellent craftsmanship.
I'm not sure if you can make out what this is since it's so close to the color of the gravel on the driveway. It was a rather large hornet's nest that fell onto the drive and busted apart. We have found 6 or 8 hornet's nest around the house site since moving out here. All of them abandoned, thank goodness. I have never encountered that many of these things in such a compact area. They were all in an area of about one acre. I wonder if that is unusual or does each group of hornets just build a new nest every year and it's just the same ones moving around? But I don't think their nests would last that long once abandoned. I was of the idea that all wasp-type critters were pretty territorial so this seems like close quarters to me. And why have they all been abandoned? Did something get them, similar to what's been happening to the honey bees with the mites?
I guess Allen and I are not the only ones that think the valley is a good place to build a home. I have been finding tons of nests of all kinds lately right around the house. When I was clearing back behind the house last week I spied this little nest. I wondered if it is a hummingbird nest? Someone of more authority would have to tell me; I don't know much about such things. The curious part is that it was built about 3 feet off the ground in a little baby tree. I thought this was awful close to the ground because of predators and such.
You can see here how small it is. It is about the same height as the diameter. I loved how the outside was kind of flowing and loose and the inside was so tight and precise. Excellent craftsmanship.
I'm not sure if you can make out what this is since it's so close to the color of the gravel on the driveway. It was a rather large hornet's nest that fell onto the drive and busted apart. We have found 6 or 8 hornet's nest around the house site since moving out here. All of them abandoned, thank goodness. I have never encountered that many of these things in such a compact area. They were all in an area of about one acre. I wonder if that is unusual or does each group of hornets just build a new nest every year and it's just the same ones moving around? But I don't think their nests would last that long once abandoned. I was of the idea that all wasp-type critters were pretty territorial so this seems like close quarters to me. And why have they all been abandoned? Did something get them, similar to what's been happening to the honey bees with the mites?
2 comments:
A nest that small probably was a hummingbird. Blue-gray gnatcatchers also build very small nests and would be my second guess.
Thanks for the info Bonnie!
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