Just yesterday, I head incessant chirping coming from the wren’s nest hidden in the plant on the deck. I took a quick photo of the babies…
I only saw 2 in the nest alive, but there were 4 eggs in the beginning.
Today, the nest was silent. 🙁
I parted the leaves for a peek in the nest. All I found was 1 dead bird.
Taking a step back, I saw the momma wren come to the plant with a worm. A worm to feed what?
Did they make it?
I guessed the birds had just hatched when I found them on 6/14 making them around 9 days old. Much too early to leave the nest.
But when I uploaded that photo to ChatGPT, it estimated the birds were already close to 5 days old by the time I spotted them. Comparing the 2 photos and the dates they were taken, the following information was provided:
If the first photo was June 14 and the chicks were only a few days old, they would be about 11–13 days old today, which is right in the normal fledging window for many wrens. The fact that the nest is now empty strongly suggests that most or all of the healthy chicks successfully fledged.
While I think something likely got them, I choose to believe ChatGPT.
Now you know: Wren eggs hatch after about 12–15 days of incubation.