March 7

Given the recent uptick in bird activity, I thought it best to inspect the bird boxes we placed in the periphery around the feeder yard. All told, we have two wren houses and a large traditionally shaped bird house that has been home to chick-a-dees the past several years.

This has become a spring ritual, to open each of the boxes and clean out the nesting material of last year’s occupants. Admittedly, I always feel a bit ashamed at doing this, because I suspect (and hope) that the soon-to-be arriving tenets will be one and the same from last year. I feel guilty in so easily removing the engineering concoctions of twigs, moss and grass knowing that the same birds will likely spend hours rebuilding.

The two wren boxes had typical wren nests –overly packed and notably large for such a small little bird. The chick-a-dee house gave me a start just as I began backing out the screws that held on the wooden base. The screws made a screeching sound on account of friction with the wood, and this caused the entire box to resonate with a high pitch as I turned the screw.

After a few moments of this, I paused because the box itself was making a deep vibrating sound within, and for the life of me I couldn’t explain it. The vibration stopped. I started on the screw again, and no sooner did the vibration begin in earnest.

At this point, a child-like fear took hold of me, as I began to invent all sorts of irrational bird-box demons which were waiting to attack the moment the floor dislodged. Curiosity eventually overruled, though I admit to jumping back quickly as the last retaining screw released its grip and the floor dropped to the ground.

Wouldn’t you know, in the midst of all the nesting material of grass and twigs and bits of dryer fluff – a queen bumblebee had made her overwinter nest. She drunkenly buzzed about just within the nest ball, awakened rudely from her hibernation.