28 Apr -2 May 2014
Orem, Utah
(E-mail from Kay Sullivan --
28 Apr 2014) :
(1st email) Was wondering if this had ever
been seen before....a phoebe feeding finch chicks.
There is a finch nest right outside my office door
(I watch the parents feed them) but this morning when I pulled up in my
car, I sat and watched a phoebe (didn't catch the sex) feeding the finch
babies...their mouths were open and I watched her or him insert insects in
their mouths. I was surprised when I noticed that
finch babies had hatched in the nest as I had seen phoebes flying from
it several times previous and naturally assumed it was their nest. Thanks
for reading this.....Kay Sullivan
(2nd email) ... I will bring my camera
tomorrow and see if I can get some pictures. I do have a witness....she
came to relieve me at lunch time and she also saw both the phoebe and the
male and female finches (they look like house finches from what I can
tell) feeding the fledglings. There are about five nests in a close
proximity to each other (all within about 20 feet). They are
built on top of light fixtures under the porch roof.
I've wondered if the phoebe lost its mate or its eggs and was occupying
one of those nests and is just responding to the sound of the babies
cheeping. Phoebes do nest under the porch also. Hopefully it will still be
going on tomorrow and I'll send you some pics! Thanks again! Kay
E-mail from Kay Sullivan --
29 Apr 2014) :
... I got my pictures! I got two great
ones of the Phoebe (appears to be male) standing in the
nest with a bug in its mouth and the babies with their mouths wide
open, waiting. Also got pics of the male and then
the female finch parents feeding the chicks also. I will send them to
you when I get home from work tonight....Kay
(E-mail from Kay Sullivan --
2 May 2014) :
The first two pictures show the
male feeding the babies and the
female in the last two. They are clearly finch
chicks...
And here is that silly
phoebe. I watched him feed them all day (looks like a male to me) and
suspect that he had been doing it for some time as I had seen a phoebe fly
from that nest for several days....I was surprised when I found out it was
actually a finch nest.
The next morning all four chicks were still in the nest when I pulled into
work but when I checked on them two hours later they had flown....
Kay Sullivan
email address:
(Response by
Kris Purdy at bottom)
Photos by Kay Sullivan
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(E-mail from
Kristin Purdy --
3 May 2014) :
I haven’t heard of the behavior, but
someone has as documented it in the Say’s Phoebe species account in
Cornell’s Birds of North America (subscription service):
Cooperative Breeding
Intraspecific cooperative breeding is not known to occur in phoebes.
However, there was 1 unusual instance of interspecific cooperative breeding
involving Say’s Phoebe and Barn Swallow (Kozma and Mathews 1995). In
s.-central New Mexico, a pair of Barn Swallows and a pair of Say’s Phoebes
were observed sharing same nest; these pairs alternated egg-laying,
incubation, and feeding of young; 2 young of each species fledged. Say’s
Phoebe shows some tolerance for encroachment by other species and has been
observed with other species (see Behavior: social and interspecific
behavior, above).
In addition, the nest that Kay photographed looks like a Say’s Phoebe nest
to me due to the coarseness of the grasses used. From both of the House
Finches nests I’ve seen (one in a Christmas tree left on my deck far too
long into the spring, and another in an ornamental spruce for sale at Cactus
and Tropicals in SLC), and from the description in Baicich and Harrison,
2005, House Finches use much finer grasses and make a much smaller cup. The
physical site of the nest works for both species, both will re-use nests and
use the nests of other species, and both species may be double-brooded in a
season. The droppings around the rim were likely deposited by the House
Finch nestlings since parents don’t remove the droppings after the first few
days and Say’s Phoebes defecate over the side.
SooOOOOooo, here’s my story, and I’m sticking to it. Last year, a pair of
Say’s Phoebes built a nest atop the beam and may have nested in it. It’s
likely too early for a first brood to be gone, so it seems more likely that
the House Finches beat them to last year’s nest, renovated the lining, laid
eggs and hatched their babies. It’s also possible that the House Finches
took over the nest once the Says Phoebes built it this year. Remember from
the paragraph above that Say’s Phoebe shows some tolerance by encroachment
of other species. When the Say’s Phoebes returned and found those big,
gaping yellow mouths open at their arrival (a trigger for breeding parents),
they just stuffed the fat green worms in.
If I were Kay, I’d send her story to the co-authors of the Cornell BNA
species account since this behavior has not been documented widely. I’ve
pasted their biographical sketches with contact info below.
Kris
About the Author(s)
John Schukman, a former high school biology teacher, received a
bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree of science from Fort Hays State
University and secondary education certification from Kansas University. He
is presently a partner in the construction firm Leavenworth Builders, LLC.
He is past president of the Leavenworth Audubon Society and is currently on
the Board of Directors of the Kansas Ornithological Society. Current
research interests include monitoring bird populations on the Fort
Leavenworth Military Reservation, analyzing the distribution of
area-sensitive forest birds in eastern Kansas, and contributing to the
Kansas Breeding Bird Atlas project. Current address: 14207 Robin Road,
Leavenworth, KS 66048-7281. E-mail:
schuksaya@aol.com.
Blair O. Wolf, a research associate in the Department of Ecology and
Evolutionary Biology at the University of Arizona, received a master’s
degree from the Department of Biology at the California State University at
San Jose in 1991, where he studied the reproductive biology of the Black
Phoebe. His doctoral research, completed in 1996 in the Zoology Department
at Arizona State University, examined the water balance, energetics, and
behavior of the Verdin during the summer in the Sonoran Desert. His current
research focuses on examining the importance of the saguaro to the water and
energy balance of desert nesting White-winged Doves. He is also interested
in energy substrate utilization, heat transfer, thermoregulation, and
microsite selection in vertebrates. Current address: Department of Ecology
and Evolutionary Biology, Biosciences West Rm. 310, P.O. Box 210088,
University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721. E-mail:
bowolf@azstarnet.com.
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