In song or in poetry, the bluebird has long been a symbol of happiness. Even though the bluebird is a bright-colored, delicate-looking bird, it is in reality a very hardy bird. Most of them winter in roughly the southern two thirds of the United States, although it is not unusual for some of them to remain as far north as New England and Ontario all winter long. For those that do winter in the south, they arrive back to their breeding grounds as early as mid February, often when snow is still on the ground. This proclivity to “challenge” the weather often results in many bluebirds freezing or starving to death during severe ice and snowstorms.
Here in Virginia, they winter from Tidewater to some of the mountain valleys of western Virginia. During severe winters they may be forced farther south to the Carolinas, but if food is available and there is not too much ice, snow, or subzero temperatures, they’ll tough it out and stay year round. 

     Bluebirds breed over most of the United States and southern Canada from the Rocky Mountains east. Males are the first to migrate or in those areas like Virginia where breeding and wintering ranges overlap, they begin to stake out a territory as early as mid February. Males warble their spring song to attract the female and try to impress her with much wing and tail spreading, revealing his bright blue jacket. The males will battle over females and even females may engage in fighting over a male. In many cases they are paired up prior to their arrival.

     The eastern bluebird is native to North America with a small population in Bermuda. They are easy to recognize and its likely that many people are seeing bluebirds on a regular basis and not realizing it. They commonly sit on poles and posts out in fields or agricultural areas, and especially on utility wires. Look for its round-shouldered or hunchback, although straight-up posture when sitting on wires.

     It flies with quick, erratic, wing beats. Its call too is easy to recognize once you know its short, soft, warble that is repeated often. About seven inches long, bluebird males are colored on back, head, tails, and wings with cobalt blue feathers edged with gray. Its breast is a cinnamon or rufous, with its lower belly white. The female is much paler and shows mostly gray above with blue rump and tail, while the young-of-the-year are similar, but with light spotting on their back and spots on their breasts. Actually the blue on all of them shows up mainly when the sunlight strikes them at the right angle. Otherwise they appear all gray above.

     Nesting begins in late-March in Virginia, maybe earlier in the southeastern part of the state and around the coast and Chesapeake Bay. Their favored nesting sites are open fields with scattered trees and hedgerows, near an orchard, or at the edge of open woodlands. The female will seek out a cavity of some sort, in a hollow branch, an old tree snag, rotting stump or rotting, or an old woodpecker hole. Her nest of grasses, animal hair, rootlets, bark strips, and down will soon hold three to seven eggs, which hatch in about 14 days.

     Both adults care for and feed the young, which fledge in about 15 to 19 days. During the summer, their diet consists of grubs, caterpillars, beetles, grasshoppers, crickets, and other insects. The male takes over the feeding chores as the first brood nears fledging, while the female begins a second brood. Most late broods are out of the nest by August but some broods may still be coming off in September. Young birds from the first brood may even assist the parents in feeding the late broods.

     At the end of August, some of the northern breeders begin gathering for migration. As they migrate they tend to flock up more, moving from the north usually by October. Wintering flocks in Virginia are made up of families consisting probably of members of the two or three broods brought off that year. In Virginia, during the late fall and winter, they depend on a great variety of wild fruits, including crabapples, poison ivy berries, sumac, elderberries, cedar berries, and others. Bluebirds will often flock up with passing bands of chickadees, kinglets, titmice, nuthatches, brown creepers, and downy and red-bellied woodpeckers. During periods of heavy snowfalls, they’ll seek shelter in heavily wooded swamps or thick stands of cedar and other conifers.

     Bluebirds have undergone numerous ups and downs in their populations. An unusually severe freeze in 1895-96 on their breeding grounds was said to have decimated their populations. Only an estimated one of every hundred birds lived to provide breeding stock for the following year. However, wildlife has an amazing ability to bounce back, providing their habitat remains intact. If nesting cover, food, and shelter is available, wildlife will fill the habitat to capacity in a relatively short time. The bluebirds regained their former numbers in five or six seasons.

     By the late 1940s, the bluebird began facing other problems. European starlings and English sparrows, which had been introduced from Europe, began competing for the same nesting cavities bluebirds and other native birds used. Also metal stakes and more recently plastic fencing was replacing old wooden fence posts, and old rotting diseased trees were being cleaned out of woodlots, and fencerows, causing a shortage of suitable nesting sites.

     Another reason for the bluebird’s decline through the 50s and 60s was the pesticide DDT. The use of DDT was banned along with certain other harmful chemicals.

     In the 1960s, under the organized sponsorship of the Audubon Society, the program of setting out proper housing forming bluebird trails was begun. Actually, bluebird houses was already being put up as far back as t the late 1930s, but now numerous birding, sportsmen and other nature clubs began taking on such programs as club projects. Additionally fish and game departments such as the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries regularly erect bluebird houses on its wildlife management areas, as do utilities companies such as Dominion Resources, and many corporations and other businesses. With less pesticide pollution of their environment and added help in having places to nest, the bluebird has recovered nicely and can be commonly seen in all parts of the state at all times of the year.  © 2004 Spike Knuth All Rights Reserved
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