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Crooked River Wetlands Complex Guided Birdwalks Schedule 2026
First and third Saturday of every month, April – September, 7:45- 10:00 am.Killdeer chick, photo by Chuck Gates
Garden for Birds
Birds need our help. Habitat loss is the #1 threat facing birds and we can do something about it in our outdoor spaces, gardens, and landscapes. Learn about the GARDEN FOR BIRDS PROJECT from Cornell Lab of Ornithology
May’s Malheur Musings
Greetings! Putting together this monthly newsletter is one of the great joys of my job. I place a pretty high value on the role it plays in keeping you connected to Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. Sometimes this means that in order to give it the attention I feel it deserves while also being fully involved in the work of FOMR on the ground, it gets delayed.
Osprey Watch
OSPREY WATCH is a global community science project that tracks osprey nesting activity over time. Think Wild is leading local efforts here in Central Oregon with participation from ECBA volunteers. Observing, monitoring nests, and submitting data on a regular basis contributes to a much larger data base that is growing all the time.
ODLT Sunrise Bird Counts
Oregon Desert Land Trust needs help with sunrise point counts in wet meadows and creeks at Trout Creek Ranch, which lies 40 miles south of Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. Join in one or both 4-hour surveys to document migratory birds and guide restoration plans across this nearly 17,000-acre private property. ODLT needs 4 more volunteers for each survey.Photo courtesy of ODLT.
Take a close look! Some familiar folks here from last year’s surveys.
Sorry, neither camera is online right now. I may still be able to get some videos and stills and post them or links t them here.
Thank you, Jim.
I am exploring options to add a live-streaming Nest camera for a Barn Owl box we are replacing this season at Luscher Farm in West Linn, and would appreciate learning the technical details of your setup.
I’ll post a comment tomorrow giving some of the details of our installation.
The nest box camera is sold by Green Backyard. https://green-backyard.com/collections/bird-box-camera/products/outdoor-poe-wired-ip-bird-box-camera/ They sell some other cameras, too. We also have a wifi version but I think the wired version is more reliable. The outside camera is an Axis P1347 surveillance camera. I bought two of these on eBay, the second one cost $30, the first, now being used on the golden eagle camera, cost $100. Our service provider that makes the camera video available to outside viewers and whose name shows up on the video frame is iVideon, one of many sources for this kind of service.In the case of ivideon, we need to have something called called “an ivideon bridge” to use the non-ivideon cameras. The kestrel camera uses s lens that came with it but the eagle camera with a very long distance to the nest (900 ft) uses a Nikon 200-600 zoom lens.
We think the camera problem is solved but it’s not streaming again for some reason. Maybe tomorrow.
12:56 Chicks are getting big (and mobile!). So fun to see.
Has the 5th egg hatched? It’s hard to tell as it looks like a lot of cotton balls. Thanks for doing this as it gives us daily highlights.
It does look like the 5th egg hatched!
7:31 5th egg still visible on left hand side of nest. 8:33:54 female leaves and new hatchling appears. Looks like all 5 eggs were viable.
10:08:14 Fourth egg hatches
This is really incredible to watch – female just brought in a mouse and is feeding the chicks @ 7:52AM.
This is an amazing opportunity to observe such a special occurrence. Thank you, Ilene, so much for giving us this gift.
You are most welcome. We are also having fun watching the other pair of kestrels on our property we call the “west” nest box kestrels, and they also have chicks that were born yesterday!
6 am first egg hatched daddy helped at about 6:03
7:15:22 female leaves the nest and second and possibly third egg seen hatching.
Pardon me, that should be 7:20:20
Second and third chick are hatching now at 7:20AM.
First egg hatching as I’m typing at 6:00AM May 20. So amazing to watch the male gently helping the nestling out of the egg. Just incredible!
Pretty amazing, Ilene. Scroll back to 5:29:26 for full sequence everyone.
6:02 pm. All 5 eggs still intact.
Very cool to have the outside ans well as the inside of the box. When feeding starts it will capture a lot of the activity.
Sherrie Pierce
11:44:50 good view of all 5 eggs, still intact.
11:31:38 lots of agitated moving around this am, culminating in a new position with one wing spread out and occasional glancing under it.
Fantastic, thank you for the second camera!
The incubation period for kestrel is 28 days so if incubation started on April 24, the first chick should hatch on May 21. If there were 3 eggs on the 19th, the 4th and 5th were probably laid the 20th and 21st and incubation started on the 22 so hatching may start on May 19th+/-. It will probably take a couple days for all the chicks to hatch for a clutch of 2 or 3 stronger chicks and a couple weaker ones. In a good year all 5 chicks could fledge. In an average year probably only 3. When food gets short or the parents are not good providers it’s survival of the fittest in the nest box. Probably not something for the faint of heart to witness.
Thanks for the reply Dick. I miscalculated by one week. Appreciate your response!
Thanks, Ilene and Dick.
Thank you for this great information, Dick.
Wonderful information, thank you, both.
Hi! When is the expected hatch date for this nest?
I believe next week sometime. We actually have another pair of kestrels in our other nest box with 5 eggs. It will be interesting to see which nest box has hatchlings first!
thank you for the update, Ilene. 🙂
5 eggs now!
I haven’t figured out when #5 was laid.
4th egg laid overnight!
Crikey!!!
We have 4 eggs! Yay!
3rd egg laid about 5pm 19 April.
I just now found that this commenting feature has been added to the webpage. Thanks, Shannon. There are other relevant comments on the golden eagle camera page.
Thanks to everyone who created this experience for us! I am new to Kestrels. At 5:50am mom was partially covering one egg but the other egg was off to one side a bit. Does anyone know if this usual?
Answered my own question. Just read that “incubation usually starts after the third egg is laid.” Fascinating!
Did not know this, thank you for the info!
Not only does the little kestrel have a very cozy box, but she gets to sleep to the sounds of frogs, too. It doesn’t get much better than that.
Thank you, all, for making this available to us. I’ve never seen a kestrel from the top before. Beautiful coloring on the head.
Does anyone know if it is normal that they leave the egg for so long between periods of incubating? Is it warmer inside the nest box?