Some of our birds nest in holes. Most often they come across colonies of shore swallows in steep river banks and in the walls of clay quarries. Shorebirds nest in a close mass, close to one another, and collect food above the water. Another burrow dweller - kingfisher- makes nests in remote forest rivers. The entrance to the flogging is usually covered by the roots of a tree growing on the shore, the branches of bushes and is not easy to notice. Nests are made in natural burrows under stones, in crevices, and in caves. heaters. They can even be seen in new residential areas of cities, where they nest under concrete slabs abandoned in vacant lots.

Kingfisher

It remains to describe hollow nesters' dwellings, many of which are common human companions.

Of the relatively large birds nesting in hollows, we will focus first of all on woodpeckers The biggest - yellow- hollows out hollows in birches, aspens, and pines at a height of up to 15 m. Its large hollow is usually somewhat elongated, almost rectangular shape, and the ground beneath it is strewn with sawdust and pieces of wood, broken off by the powerful beak of the yellowtail.

Great Spotted Woodpecker prefers aspen trees for hollows. The entrance is completely round, with a diameter of 5-6 cm and located at a height of two to five meters. Often it is located under the tinder fungus as if under a visor. On the same tree there are several test holes, among which it is not immediately possible to find the real hole. Woodpecker chicks always give themselves away by screaming.

Hollow green woodpecker something round, but larger than that of the big motley one. The Green Woodpecker is a wary bird and to observe it you must be patient and quiet.

Positive chiselling value woodpeckers is not only about destroying

xylophagous insects, but also in their construction activities: using a hollow only once, they provide shelters and homes for hollow-nesting birds that do not have enough “area,” as well as dormice, martens, squirrels, and bats.

In old woodpecker hollows willingly settles in wood pigeon. The incubating female is sometimes visible from the outside. Keeps them occupied and wryneck- a bird from the order Woodpeckers, so named for the way its chicks hiss and rotate their heads when they see an enemy. In the dim depths of the hollow, the predator easily mistakes the bird for a snake and retreats.

Jackdaw also belongs to the cavity nesters, but lives not in the forest, but near humans - this is one of the synanthropic species. Jackdaws settle in small colonies in attics, behind gates, in bell towers and, which is very unpleasant, in chimneys and chimneys. Jackdaw nests are made from twigs with all kinds of bedding - even paper and thread.

Starlings If they are not offered houses, they also make nests in hollows. The outside of the starling's hollow is often smeared with droppings.

From small hollow nesters in gardens, parks and mixed forests most common pied flycatcher. She begins nesting late, in May, when tits already have chicks. She places birch bark and dry leaves at the base of the nest, and winds thin dry blades of grass on top. The pestle has 5-6 bright blue eggs.

Unlike the pestle gray flycatcher does not occupy hollows or titmice, but often nests close to housing: on eaves, horizontal beams under the roof, behind platbands. Its nest is a careless heap of all kinds of rubbish (papers, hair, rags, feathers), compressed by the weight of the bird and its offspring. The nest is almost never visible under the incubating bird. Occupies similar places white wagtail, but she tries to make a nest under some kind of roof, at least under the canopy of a slate roof. The white wagtail is called a semi-hollow nester, since it does not live in real hollows.

Titmouses and birdhouses very often occupy sparrows - house and field sparrows. Their tropical relatives - weavers- make spherical nests. The sparrow also builds the same spherical nest, but in a house. Therefore, after the sparrow, not a single bird can occupy his apartment without cleaning it, there are so many feathers, straw, tow - right up to the roof!

However, gradually all this garbage disperses to other nests. Except starling, not a single bird cleans its home after itself. In artificial nests, a person has to do this.

Less often than pied flycatchers, hollows and hollows in the garden are occupied by garden redstarts. Their buildings resemble the nests of pied birds, but are somewhat looser. With frequent visits redstarts easily throw the masonry.

Construction common nuthatch can be easily distinguished by the clay coating of the taphole, both from the inside and sometimes from the outside. The nuthatch narrows the “door” according to its growth. The bedding in the hollow is a pile of pine bark.

tits They start nesting very early. Usually the great tit settles in nest boxes. Tit nests very thick and warm, take up a lot of space in the house. The base is usually a lot of moss, which is supported by a tray of wild animal wool and horsehair. Tits have large clutches - up to 15 eggs, which are larger in great tits than in other species. The eggs are speckled, the background is always white.

Titmouse very rarely occupies artificial nesting sites; usually she prefers to hollow out hollows herself. This is a difficult task for such a small bird, so the chickadee chooses thin, rotten aspen and alder trees for its hollow. Letok always irregular shape, pieces of wood plucked off by the beak stick out...

pika, Unlike the nuthatch, it cannot be called a true cavity nester. Usually she chooses cracks and voids behind loose bark, long dilapidated hollows. The pillars of such a shelter are very unreliable, so pika makes a nest with a deep, strong tray from the most various materials, tightly stitched with cobwebs.

Black swifts They return from wintering late, when all the nesting sites are mostly occupied, but, as large and strong birds, they expel sparrows and other birds from their houses, even despite the presence of clutches or chicks in those houses. Nesting material swift- highly specialized flyer - catches in the air. He uses any little thing - straws, fluffs, threads and hairs raised by the wind - for a nest. To prevent it from flying apart, the swift cements this pile with its own saliva. He uses one nest for several years, since catching material for a new one is not an easy task. The old nest reaches 15 cm in diameter.

During the period of feeding the chicks, a further increase in the activity of the adult bird is observed. This, of course, applies to a greater extent to chicks or species whose chicks require tireless care. The birds subordinate their entire “schedule” to feeding the brood, sometimes at the expense of their own feeding. For example , pied flycatcher brings food to chicks up to 600 times a day. The number of arrivals to the nest per unit of time for any species of bird is easy for an observer to calculate himself. Such figures are usually very instructive, since they directly reflect the positive role of insectivorous birds in the forest biocenosis.

Every living creature has its own home. There are different houses - for some it is a hole, for others it is a treehouse, and still others carry a house on their back. But no matter how different the houses are, they perform the same functions: to make it warm and cozy, as well as protection from environment and predators. Also, when choosing a home, animals resort to different methods: some are content with a rotten stump, while others diligently and painstakingly dig a hole. Perhaps the most scrupulous housebuilders among the animal world are birds.

The most skilled builder among birds - . The construction of the nest is done by the male. He selects a twig - the basis for the future nest, the thinnest one and sometimes above the water - so that it is difficult for predators to reach it, and begins to twist.

It wraps green blades of grass around a branch and, with the help of its paws and beak, ties knots in flight. The base for the nest is ready. The weaver selects the material most carefully. He does not pick up torn off and dry twigs, but finds and tears off the leaf he needs. Main criterion building material, a green narrow leaf 25-30 cm long. After all, a fresh green leaf is stronger and braids very well. The nest turns out to be an elongated oval shape. It is very durable and is not afraid of either rain or wind. Nest construction is unusual shape attracting a female. The female chooses the highest quality and well-designed work. After the nest is populated, the weaver leaves it and begins to make a new one.

Another representative of the feathered family that attracts and wins the heart of a lady with the help of its construction abilities is. In construction, he uses all his design and creative abilities. After all, the female is very capricious, and if she doesn’t like something, the male will be rejected, and all his efforts will be in vain.

To begin with, the male builder clears the selected territory of debris, unnecessary twigs and leaves. He then collects and weaves twigs and blades of grass into a beautiful tunnel. But the bowerbird spends its main efforts on decorating its nest. An interesting and unusual thing is that female bowerbirds prefer blue and blue colors. Males all over the area are looking for things of these shades. Anything can serve as decoration, even garbage: caps, pieces of paper, strings. Sometimes pebbles, flowers, shells and other details are used that can successfully fit into the design of the constructed hut.

The most durable nests Vyut red stove makers. Both the female and the male are engaged in construction, since it is very difficult to build such a fortress alone. Several months of painstaking work bear fruit - the nest retains heat, protects from rain, cold and predators. Main building material is soaked soft clay. During the construction of the nest, it is carried and used 3.5 - 5.5 kg clay mass. A mixture of softened clay and plant fibers dries to form strong and heavy walls.

The stove maker never uses the same nest twice, next year for a new clutch, he makes a new nest, and other birds can populate the old one.

Making an unusual nest Swifts. More precisely, the building nesting material is unusual - swift saliva. The swift applies a drop of saliva to the selected nesting site and begins, smearing it, to draw the contours of the future nest. The viscous saliva hardens, and then the next layer is applied - this is how the walls of the nest are built up. After 40 days, the nest is ready.

The nest of the swiftlet is also known for its edibility. Many gourmets are willing to pay good money to taste the famous “swallow’s nest” soup. As lovers of exotic food claim, a well-cooked “swallow’s nest” resembles sturgeon caviar.

This unique “edible” feature of the nest had a detrimental effect on the swiftlet population. Nest collectors do not pay attention to prey seasons and tear down nests, destroying chicks and egg clutches. The number of some species of swifts has decreased by 80-90%, and some have disappeared completely.

The harshest place nesting - at palm swifts. They collect nesting material from down and feathers, and use saliva to glue it to the inside of a palm leaf in an upright position. The palm swift also glues the eggs onto the finished nest-bedding. The eggs are hatched in this hanging position. Like all swifts, the chicks hatch completely naked, but soon they are covered with down. The hatched chick clings to the litter with its claws so as not to fall. And in this position - with its chest to the litter and head up, it hangs until it grows up and is completely covered with feathers.

U king -lightest nest. Weighs only 20 grams. The nest is made high above the ground in spruce or pine branches. It is made of moss, cobwebs, fluff, feathers, and hairs. In appearance, the nest seems very fragile and unsuitable for hatching eggs, but this is not so. King's nest for a long time keeps warm, so the female can safely leave the clutch for 1.5 hours. During rain, the nest can absorb 60 ml of water, and at the same time be completely dry inside. Another feature of the nest is that it can expand as the chicks grow. The kinglet's nest is very difficult to notice, because it looks like a small ball of fur stuck among spruce needles.

The biggest nest belongs Australian eyed hen. In winter, during the rainy season, the male and female begin to dig a hole 1 meter deep and 3 meters wide. The hole is then covered with leaves, grass and other plant material. As soon as the greenery is slightly covered with sediment, the pile is covered with sand. A notch is made at the top where eggs are subsequently laid. This is how an incubator nest is built.

Since as a result of the rotting of wet leaves, heat is generated - 33 degrees Celsius, necessary for hatching eggs. The male controls the temperature of the incubator for 10 months by adding or removing soil. The size of the ocellated hen's nest is impressive: it reaches a height of 1.5 meters, and in width reaches almost 4 meters.

What a nest!

1 view

Birds are real craftsmen in arranging places for laying and incubating eggs. Some of them are skilled knitters, others are pottery masters. Bird houses can take on all sorts of shapes and sizes. A selection of the most amazing nests will help you verify this.

Bowerbird's house

When Europeans first discovered miniature huts decorated with berries and flowers in the forests of Guinea, they believed that this was the work of local children. In fact, these amazing nests were built by birds - bowerbirds.

The male is ready to spend up to 6 months a year building his “architecture”. And all this is just to attract the attention of representatives of the opposite sex.

The bowerbird builds its house on the ground. He builds it from dry grass, using it as a support for the structure. river pebbles and seashells. Decorative elements include flowers collected in the area, bright berries and colorful small objects found nearby. Before entering the house, they lay out treasures in the form of shiny bugs, brightly colored pieces of moss, bottle caps and pieces of plastic.

The most surprising thing is that the females, having appreciated the efforts of the bowerbird, lay eggs not inside the erected “palace”, but next to it, settling in a very ordinary nest.

Incubator nests

Australian birds of the megapod family are famous in an unusual way masonry Starting in mid-spring, a married couple digs a hole 300 cm in diameter and 100 cm deep. They fill it with plant material collected from a radius of up to a hundred meters. After waiting for the first precipitation to moisten the material, the male ocellates cover the bottom of the hole with a layer of sand and build a niche on top for the eggs.

The height of the structure can reach 1.5 meters with a width of 4.5 meters.

Inside the multi-layer moistened structure, all conditions are created for the rotting of plants, during which heat is released. Under the influence of sunlight, the heap warms up to 33°C.

The male tirelessly guards the heap until the moment of laying eggs, checking the temperature level several times a day with receptors located on his beak. In case of deviation from the norm, he corrects it by sprinkling or, on the contrary, reducing the soil.

The fruits of the weavers' creations

Baya weavers are rightfully considered the most skilled builders. These feathered craftsmen have learned not only to intertwine blades of grass and plant fibers with each other, but also to tie them into knots to secure them. The result is houses that look like cocoons or beehives.

“Motor” birds are capable of dissolving a large palm leaf into individual fibers in just 10-15 minutes.

The construction of houses is carried out exclusively by males. As a support, they choose a strong, well-branched fork, the branches of which hang down. During the construction period, this section of the branch serves as a perch. Weavers weave their houses from durable palm fibers and elastic green grass. To increase the strength of the weaving, from time to time they change the directions of the “threads”, forming a fancy openwork pattern.

The finished house is a teardrop-shaped structure with a horizontal long axis. The inlet is facing downwards.

Having completed the construction of the house, the males begin to invite females. To do this, they hang under the nest with their heads towards the hole and energetically flap their wings, emitting a characteristic whistle. Attracted by the sound, the female inspects the “possession”. If the master pleases, then the female settles in him, but if not, she has to build a new one. The rejected house remains empty, losing its attractiveness. After this, the male simply destroys the fruit of his efforts.

Birds of the Grebe family spend most of their lives in fresh water bodies framed by well-developed marsh vegetation. They are excellent divers and swimmers. If disturbed, grebes dive under the water, exposing only their heads to the surface, like the periscope of a submarine.

It is quite logical that they make their nests on the water. Their houses, like rafts, can float throughout the pond.

The basis for making amazing mobile bird nests is mud, algae and the remains of dead vegetation. One nest can easily accommodate 6-8 eggs. If the grebe is going to leave for a while, she covers the clutch with plant debris, making it inconspicuous to potential enemies.

“Fortresses” of stove makers

The most durable houses are built by red stove-makers. The nests are durable and rather heavy structures. That's why birds build them on reliable basis, the role of which is most often played by buildings and fence posts.

The basis for making houses is clay, moist soil. To increase its strength, feathered craftsmen add small branches and dry grass into it. The result is a house that, after drying in the sun, is so strong that it can only be broken with a strong blow from a hammer.

It takes a stove maker up to 5-6 months to build such a house. But this does not stop the feathered workers from building new nests every year. In one season they manage to build entire high-rise buildings.

The entrance hole to the nest is located at the bottom of the “fortress”. From the external entrance, a small tunnel is laid in a spiral, leading to a nesting chamber located under the gently sloping top.

Fragile nests of crested swifts

The complete opposite of the fortresses of the stove-makers are the nests of crested swifts. They attach their houses to horizontal branches only 2 cm thick. These branches act as supports for the back wall of the house. The house itself is woven from tree bark, leaves and feathers. All elements are held together by an adhesive substance secreted by the salivary glands of swifts.

The result is structures in the form of elongated semicircular cups with delicate walls, the thickness of which does not exceed parchment. The dimensions of these amazing bird nests are so small that only a single egg laid by the female can fit into the cavity. The size and fragility of the nest do not allow the bird to stay in it. Therefore, while waiting for offspring, parents simply sit nearby on a twig, covering the only egg with their tummies.

Dormitory houses

What distinguishes African social weavers from other birds is that they build the most spectacular houses in terms of dimensions. Birds that prefer to live in community build nests that can easily accommodate up to a hundred couples. Externally, such a house resembles a cirrus cloud or a stack of snow. The size of the nest, collected from twigs and blades of grass, can reach 8 meters in length.

It is noteworthy that these amazing bird nests are well structured. The house includes many cells, each of which lives a separate family. Each cell has its own entrance. All entrance openings are located at the bottom of the house. To protect against the penetration of predators, they are equipped with transverse sticks.

The walls of the structure perfectly retain heat, maintaining an optimal temperature for the household. For comparison, if the temperature outside rises to +30°C, then inside the house it remains at +8°C.

It is noteworthy that weavers often rent out their nesting “estates”. Ashy tits and red-headed finches come to live with them.

Salagan gourmet houses

The swiftlets, which live on the shores of the South China Sea, build their homes in the arches of rocks and caves. They build nests from algae, holding them together with their own saliva. Sometimes they decorate their houses with fry of scallops and eggs. It turns out that these amazing bird nests consist of completely edible components.

It is not surprising that in oriental cuisine, bird houses are considered not only a delicacy, but also very healthy dishes. According to local residents, they are a panacea for all diseases.

When boiled, the structure of salagan nests resembles a gelatin solution, which contains large amounts of iodine, phosphorus, iron and calcium. This delicacy costs a lot. The price of the product can reach 2 thousand USD. per kilogram.

The songbirds of the cisticola family, which live in eastern India and southern China, are real mistresses. They make their nests inside rolled leaves.

To hold the walls of the house together, they pierce the leaves with their beaks in several places. Through the holes, dressmakers thread bendable plant stems, hard straws and sticky tufts of cobwebs. In this simple way they literally sew the edges of the sheet together.

Inside the formed tunnel, the birds build a smaller cup-shaped nest, using small blades of grass and soft spikelets. Thanks to this, the red-fronted dressmaker's house remains almost invisible from the outside.

Nests by inheritance

Large birds, such as storks or eagles, pass down their nests to generations.

Storks prefer to settle close to people, building houses on trees, roofs of houses, factory chimneys and electric poles. One nest serves the family for several years in a row. The older the house, the wider it is in diameter. Perennial dwellings can weigh up to 2-3 centners. The nest of white storks in Germany is recognized as one of the oldest, which existed on the tower for about 4 hundred years.

Eagles, on the contrary, locate their homes on inaccessible rocks. Their nests are very massive and are spacious platforms made of different-sized branches.

The most famous bald eagle nest is located in the US state of Ohio. It is 2.5 meters in diameter, 3 meters in height and weighs about 2 tons.

Who can live without nests?

There are actually quite a few birds that do not build nests: guillemots, kingfishers, troupials, some species of widows and owls.

Gyrfalcons do not waste time building houses. They use old crow houses to lay eggs. In the absence of such, they simply find secluded corners in the recesses of stones hidden from the wind. It is noteworthy that gyrfalcons prefer to live in the same nests generation after generation. A nest was discovered in the rocks of Greenland, the age of which reached 2.5 thousand years.

The amazing nightjar bird does not build nests either. The female simply lays her eggs directly on the ground. If there is a litter of last year’s reddish needles nearby, he uses it, but if there is none, just lay it on the bare ground.

From morning to evening Akimushkin Igor Ivanovich

Different birds - different nests

Having talked about the everyday life of the swimming fathers, we again returned to the birds. Let's stay in their kingdom a little longer.

So, the courtship is over, places for nests have been found, and the couples have become engaged. Now feathered parents have new concerns.

We need to build nests. Storks, gulls and eagles have equal rights in this matter: both the female and the male are engaged in nest building. Others (thrush, finch) have only females. There are also those in which males build (phalaropes, wrens, telegalls).

And wild pigeons, for example, and heron herons have established this division of labor: the male collects and brings various blades of grass and twigs, and the female builds a nest from them.

What does it bring? In the beak, not in the paws: some drag along a twig (pigeons, herons, cormorants), others stuff a full beak with blades of grass (for example, canaries).

And parrots transport building material very in an original way: they stuff it into the plumage of the back and so they fly with the load behind their shoulders.

Nightjars are birds without nests (it’s strange to even think about that!). They lay their two eggs directly on pine needles and incubate them, as they say, on bare ground.

Ducks and geese in a hummock (or between hummocks!) knock out a small hole with their bodies and line it with only those stems and blades of grass that they can reach with their beaks. When they leave the nest, they cover it with soft feathers plucked from the belly.

For other birds, nests are a miracle of construction art. For example, in the titmouse, in the dressmaker bird, which has already been discussed, or in the hammerheaded birds of Africa.

Weavers of the genus Quelea tie their nest to a tree with real knots. They pass fibers pulled from plants several times through their fingers so that a loop is formed, and then they take the end of the “rope” with their beak and tighten the loop tightly.

The smallest hummingbirds have nests the size of a thimble, vultures and eagles weigh several hundredweight! But the largest nests are those of social weavers. Their females build under common roof many small closets. An apartment bird's house sometimes covers the crown of the entire tree.

And the material for nests is different: twigs, blades of grass, fluff, feathers, wool, leaves, silt, clay. Even your own saliva! The salangan swift, well known to all local gourmets, lives in South Asia and Australia. From its nests they cook... soup.

This is how she builds a nest: she clings to a rock with her paws and smears the stone with sticky saliva, drawing the silhouette of a cradle on it. He moves his head to the right and left - the saliva immediately freezes and turns into a brownish crust. And the swiftlet keeps it lubricated from above. The walls of the nest grow, and it turns out to be a small cradle on a huge rock.

This lullaby is said to be very tasty. People climb high cliffs, climb cave walls by torchlight, and collect swiftlet nests. Then boil them in boiling water or chicken broth, and it turns out to be an excellent soup, as experts say.

Quite recently, it was discovered that swiftlets are of interest not only to gastronomes, but also to biophysicists: these birds, flying in the dark, send forward acoustic scouts that “crackle like a child’s wind-up toy” - that is, they “probe” the surroundings with ultrasound.

The Siamese swift Cypsiurus - it lives next to the swiftlet - also glues its nests with saliva: it also collects feathers on the leaves large palm trees glues feather to feather.

And so that when the wind is strong, the eggs do not fall out of the feather bed, he glues them to the bottom of the nest.

Flamingos make nests out of silt: rather tall pedestals with a recess on the top.

With such long legs, which evolution has endowed flamingos with, only high cabinet and you can sit with some comfort.

In Brazil, almost everywhere on the thick branches of large trees growing near huts and villages, you can see rather heavy lumps of clay. Small red-yellow birds, similar to blackbirds, scurry around the trees with a piercing cry. These are oven birds, and the clay “melons” in the trees are their nests. Each nest is a real “brick” house with a canopy and a room (it weighs 3–4 kilograms, while the bird itself weighs only 80 grams).

The male and female build the nest together. First, “bricks” are prepared - large lumps the size of a rifle bullet are rolled out of clay. For strength, plant fibers are mixed into the clay. Bricks are brought to the tree. On a thick branch they lay the foundation of the future nest. Birds have no other tools than beaks and paws, but with the help of these simple “tools” they quickly complete the foundation of the house and begin to build vaulted walls. And then a dome-shaped roof. They leave it in one of the walls round hole. This is the door. Interior divided into two rooms. And the house is ready!

When the Kalao rhinoceros builds a nest, it also carries clay in its beak.

Kalao are found in India and nest in tree hollows. As soon as the female climbs into the hollow and lays the first egg there, the male begins to cover the entrance to the hollow with a special solution of clay, silt and his own droppings and soon immures his girlfriend in it. It leaves only a small gap through which the female can stick her beak. For several weeks, until the chicks hatch from the eggs, she sits in captivity. All this time, the male feeds the prisoner with insects and fruits. When the chicks hatch and become stronger, the male breaks the clay wall with his thick beak and releases the female and the children to freedom. The spouses have a strange relationship...

It turns out that during incubation, the female rhinoceros bird moults. Almost all her feathers fall out at once. In this form, the bird is completely helpless. That is why the male walls her up in a hollow. Behind the clay wall she is both warm and safe.

But if the male dies, the female will also die: without his help she cannot get out of captivity.

It is a troublesome business to build nests. Troubling and difficult.

How difficult, the poor telegall (Australian weed chicken) could tell, who has to build “Egyptian pyramids” to warm his eggs.

When the first explorers of Australia saw strange earthen mounds on the plains of this country, they mistook them for the burial mounds of the natives. But it turned out that these were... bird's nests. And not simple nests, but incubators!

Telegalls do not incubate their eggs. They bury them in piles of rotting garbage. The heat released during rotting warms the eggs. The eggs develop in a garbage heap, just like in a real incubator.

The “incubators” are built by the rooster. With large and strong legs, he rakes all kinds of garbage into a pile. He works for many days and builds a truly grandiose structure: some mounds-nests of telegalls reach a height of five meters! Weed chicken buildings were found fifty paces around the circumference.

When the “incubator” is ready, the females approach it and, climbing onto a pile of garbage, bury their eggs in it. One egg at a time into separate holes. Eggs are always buried with the blunt end up to make it easier for the chicks to get out of the shell.

The rooster stays at the “incubator” for many days. If the leaves in the pile develop too much from rotting leaves heat, he rake out the excess layer of earth or make deep vents on the side. If there is not enough heat, throw some more debris on top. To measure temperature, the rooster has his own “thermometer” - inner side he has no feathers, and by touching the nest with his naked body, the rooster instinctively knows what the temperature is in it. Normal - 30–32 degrees.

After 9–12 weeks, the chickens hatch from the eggs; they have difficult work to do: they need to get to the surface from under a layer of earth and debris sometimes up to 1–2 meters thick. But newborn chicks are far from helpless. They are born fully fledged, very large and strong. Like moles, they tirelessly dig the ground with their feet and wings and soon crawl out onto fresh air. Having dried in the sun and dusted themselves off, the young Telegalls begin independent life. At this time they already know how to fly!

In our swamps and rivers there is a bird that also warms its nest with the warmth of rotting plants. This is a grebe, or grebe. The grebe's nest, built from old reeds, is like a miniature raft and is freely transported by the wind from one part of the lake to another. The warmth of the rotting plants on which the eggs lie protects them from cooling from below. Of course, the primitive “greenhouse” of the great grebe only vaguely resembles the powerful “incubators” of telegalls.

Woodpeckers make hollows in old trees for nests. And they are not lined with anything inside. The chicks sit upright on a hard tree. But they have shock-absorbing calluses on their legs and heels, so young woodpeckers don’t have “bedsores.”

All other birds - tits, redstarts, sparrows, and starlings - which often settle in hollows abandoned by woodpeckers, build ordinary nests there.

Falcons and owls do not build nests, but slightly remodel magpies' and crows' nests in their own way. One American owl breeds chicks even in marmot burrows.

Oropendola birds are found in Central America. They weave very complex, pitcher-like nests that they hang from tree branches. In the tropics, various delicacies hunt for bird eggs: monkeys, wild cats, lizards, snakes, raccoons, opossums - there are a lot of them, they all climb trees very well, and it is not easy for birds to protect their offspring from them.

But predators do not risk climbing into the “jugs” of oropendolas, because dangerous balls - wasp nests - are always hanging on a branch next to them. Oropendolas usually build nests on branches where wasps have settled. Wasps do not touch their neighbors - birds, but all uninvited guests they sting without mercy.

The micropternus woodpecker made friends with ants. Without fear, he builds a nest right in the middle of the anthill of his burning “friends.”

There are kingfishers that nest in termite mounds, and sparrows and wagtails in the nests of eagles and storks.

In short, there is great diversity here.

It is impossible to tell about all models of bird nests.

Anyone who wants to learn more about them will be happy to read an excellent book about birds by a great expert on them, Oscar Heinroth (“From the Life of Birds”). There's a lot of interesting stuff there.

And now we’ll see what concerns bother the feathered parents after the nest is built.

From the book Naughty Child of the Biosphere [Conversations about human behavior in the company of birds, animals and children] author Dolnik Viktor Rafaelevich

Different types of agriculture produce different social results. Of the four original types of agriculture listed above, the first and last have no obstacles to individual ownership of land. Isolated from outside attacks, groups in such conditions could easily

From the book Animal Life, Volume II, Birds author Bram Alfred Edmund

Volume II, Birds FOREWORD BY THE COMPILERS TO THE VOLUME “BIRDS” Birds are perhaps the most common animals encountered modern man. It is not surprising when you consider that, according to the English ornithologist James Fisher, our planet is home to more than 100 billion

From the book Tropical Nature author Wallace Alfred Russell

Nests Hummingbird nests, as you would expect, are extremely elegant and in some cases no more than half walnut. Such cup-shaped nests are usually placed in the branches of branches and are mostly decorated on the outside with threads of lichens. They are being built in

From the book Insects Protect themselves author

Different ways protection The ways to protect insects from enemies are endless in their variety. Anyone who is often in nature can notice that as soon as any animal becomes numerous - be it a lizard, a bird, an animal, an insect - it immediately becomes smaller.

From the book Little Toilers of the Forest [Ants; illustrations by V. Grebennikov] author Marikovsky Pavel Iustinovich

Various responsibilities Peace-loving residents do not sit idle: In the morning soldiers run to the post, And nannies run to kindergarten. S. Mikhalkov. Division of labor. I can’t imagine what would happen if there were no divisions in the anthill - this large society with a complex life

From the book We and Her Majesty DNA author Polkanov Fedor Mikhailovich

Same but different Purple flowered peas were crossed with white flowered peas. The result was hybrids with purple flowers - the rule of dominance had an effect. Let's try to compare two externally identical plants - from the parent and the first generation. They're on top of each other

From the book Reading Between the Lines of DNA [The Second Code of Our Life, or a Book Everyone Should Read] author Spork Peter

Why are humans and chimpanzees so different? How is this possible? Man, the self-proclaimed crown of creation, is an amazingly complex creature, with 200 types of cells, dozens of organs, consisting of billions of cells, capable of living up to 120 years and possessing the most

From the book Embryos, Genes and Evolution by Raff Rudolf A

Different types of molecular evolution When discussing the fossil record and the rates of morphological evolution derived from it, it was tacitly assumed that these rates reflected changes in the genome. The existence of a connection between genome evolution and morphological

From the book The Human Genetic Odyssey by Wells Spencer

From the Nest Taking into account the resulting portrait, it can be concluded that the Y-chromosomal Adam belonged to the groups of populations living about 60,000 years ago in East and/or Southern Africa from which the modern San descend. Age of the first oldest human populations

From the book Evolution [ Classic ideas in light of new discoveries] author Markov Alexander Vladimirovich

Different paths leading to the same goal The long-term experiment of Lenski and his colleagues is far from the only study of this kind. IN last years Many microbiologists became interested in studying "evolution in vitro." In this case, a variety of problems are solved. Here,

From the book Animal World. Volume 3 [Bird Stories] author Akimushkin Igor Ivanovich

Nests made of bricks Apparently, there are about a hundred billion birds, not species, but individuals, on our planet. It must be assumed that passerines in this winged population of the earth are superior to all other orders. There are probably about a billion sparrows in the world alone. To talk about passerines, even

From the book In Search of Memory [Emergence new science about the human psyche] author Kandel Eric Richard

Dressmaker birds and weaver birds Dressmaker birds live in India, Ceylon, Indochina and Java: 7 species and all sew nests from leaves. They bend one or several leaves growing nearby with a bag, pierce their edges with a beak and sew the leaves together, threading cobwebs or fibers from the leaves into the holes.

From the book Animal World author Sitnikov Vitaly Pavlovich

From the book Secrets of Gender [Man and Woman in the Mirror of Evolution] author Butovskaya Marina Lvovna

From the author's book

Chapter 6. Adam and Eve (different and equal) Male and female bodies Anthropological studies show that men and women differ in body structure. In men, the muscular type of constitution predominates: they are characterized by broad shoulders and narrow hips. Women predominate

The construction technique, final shape and main characteristics of bird buildings - primarily their strength and heat capacity - are determined by the properties of the nesting material.

Birds simply pile up thick, rigid branches of trees and shrubs, trying to fit them together as tightly as possible. Large birds of prey and storks build their massive platform nests in trees in this way, achieving truly outstanding results.

Perennial nests

Once folded, the nest, clearly visible from all sides, becomes a landmark of the area for many years. It will be occupied for decades by different individuals, who, due to their natural industriousness, will also make their contribution to the accumulation of nesting material. The thickness of the platform will grow from year to year, the platform will turn into an impressive tower.

The famous bald eagle nest near Vermilion in Ohio (USA) was 2.5 meters in diameter and more than 3 meters high, weighing approximately 2 tons. This is probably the most massive structure of birds that, without any stretch of the imagination, can be called a typical nest intended for breeding offspring married couple. Only slightly inferior to this colossal structure are the nests of Pacific Steller's sea eagles in Kamchatka. The size of the black vulture's nest resembles the wheel of the heaviest dump truck, reaching a two-meter diameter and almost a meter in thickness. Taking advantage of the peaceful nature of the owners, entire bird families are housed within its walls, and they tolerate each other quite well.

Materials for building nests

Many birds resort to this same simple layer-by-layer folding technique. For aquatic birds, the material used is not branches, but various fragments aquatic plants. The material is laid in a wet state, which, when dried, imparts additional strength to the building due to the effect of “gluing” the drying fragments.

Small birds with miniature nests have cobwebs among their favorite materials, and they spend a lot of time searching for them. Being sticky and durable, it acts as a cementing material, holding together individual layers of dry grass, and perfectly secures nests to tree branches.

Nests of tropical sunbirds

The nests of tropical sunbirds are very unique in design and easily recognizable. In most species, the structure looks like a very elongated pear, hanging on the tip of a thin branch or suspended from bottom side palm or banana leaf. In the lower expanded part of the “pear” there is a closed nesting chamber with a narrow side entrance, usually covered on top by a small canopy. The building is very miniature, and even a tiny sunbird does not fit inside completely, so the head of the hen with a long curved beak is almost always visible from the outside. The main building material is plant fluff, held together with a large amount of cobwebs, which is also used for hanging the nest.

Thanks to a large number cobwebs flickering in sun rays, the nests of some species look very elegant and resemble Christmas decorations, who by misunderstanding ended up on a palm tree. In general, the love of sunbirds for the web is all-consuming - Russian name spider-eaters, applied to some representatives of this group of birds, should be changed to spider-lovers. Some sunbirds do not build nests at all. Having found a good layer of cobwebs in a secluded corner in the crown of a tree, they lightly rake it in one place and lay eggs in the resulting tray.

Warbler nests

Worthy of mention are the nests of warblers, skillfully mounted on vertical stems standing next to each other. The stems pass through the side walls of the nest, which is held on supports mainly by friction or “glued” using putty made of silt and mud. The shape of the warbler's nest resembles a cylinder or a ball with a truncated top, neatly twisted from blades of grass and reed leaves. The edges of the tray are always tightly pulled together, the inside is sometimes “plastered” with the same mud, which, when dried, forms smooth surface. Sometimes warblers attach a nest to living, growing stems of nettle, meadowsweet or fireweed, and in the month that elapses from the time the building is laid until the chicks fly, it sometimes rises up almost half a meter. The nest is attached with the side walls to the reed stems.

How birds build nests. Bird nesting