Spotted Towhee Nest - Arapahoe

[Jared Del Rosso]

Indulge me.

Tonight, after eating a salad from the garden (in west Centennial), I found a few green caterpillars on my counter (White Cabbage, perhaps?). I brought those out to my chickens then went to my spinach to look for more on the holey spinach leaves. At the edge of my vision, something flushed. I figured a small rabbit, but instead spotted a female Spotted Towhee wandering nearby and calling. Looking up, I spotted the bird's nest. It's just past my yard, in my neighbors, in a small space between her lattice and my garden box. A page of a Sunday edition of the New York Times frames it. (I used the pages of the paper to keep my volunteer lettuce alive amid the early spring freezes.)

It's a rather pretty nest. I like to think my piles of yard waste helped it along. It's woven, rather intricately, of what seem to be dead grasses. Three small, brown eggs are tucked neatly inside. No sign of a cowbird egg in there (yet), though a female was skulking around my yard today. 

There appear to be two hyper-local pairs of Spotted Towhee, one that spends much of the day in my yard and another that spends much of the day in the neighbors. Don't know which of those pairs this reflects.

This finding felt like pure magic. Here's to a successful nest. 

- Jared Del Rosso

Centennial, CO

[rosanne juergens]

Those eggs are darling - I hope they successfully hatch!

Rosanne J

Centennial