The Blackbird's - Stoke 2004

I got home from work on Friday to find the nest almost destroyed - I suspect by a cat. 3 young missing presumed dead. 2 still there but both wounded. The nest had been dragged down and was almost on its side. One of the 2 chicks was almost out of the nest. As soon as the parent had moved away, I braced the nest underneath with a basket, moved the remaining chicks into the middle and braced the basket underneath with canes. This brought it horizontal again and back up to its original height, but the shape was anything but 'nestlike'. It had to do, as the mother was back with food. I had used gloves to move the chicks, so she accepted them and the repaired nest ok . Now we just wait to see if either of the wounded chicks survive the night......

Well it was a cat attack that did the damage - just before I went to bed, I heard the alarm calls and went outside to find a cat just about to go into the bush with the nest. My kick missed it, but it ran off. I decided to build 'D' day style defenses - a layer of Pyrocantha cuttings were spread around the base of the bush.

In the morning I heard alarm calls again. I rushed downstairs to find the same cat trying to remove the Pyrocantha. My kick missed again. The cat ran off, I re-built the defenses, checked that the chicks were still ok. The female flew back to the nest. The shots below show the female on the repaired nest (you can just see the basket at the bottom)and the Pyrocantha defenses (brown) with the basket at the top of the shot.

Well, the 2 remaining birds left the nest today, day 15 , June 10th.
The problem was, the cat was waiting for them. Neither chick survived.