Earlier this month, as I was hanging laundry on the clothesline, I heard a rustling noise coming from the clematis beside me. It vines up a repurposed cot spring trellis attached to the T-bar clothesline post. A male cardinal flew out and landed on a nearby tree branch. After I finished hanging up the clothes and returned to the house, I happened to look out the kitchen window and saw a female cardinal fly away from the clematis and toward the tree.

I told Bill about the cardinal activity. He went out and carefully poked through the vines and found a partially completed nest on top of the T-bar, a precarious place to build a nursery!

Once the nest was complete, the female laid two eggs. Trying not to be too intrusive, Bill monitored the activity and repositioned the nest when it started to slide off the crossbar. Finally, the eggs hatched. After a several days, we took pictures while the parents were out shopping for groceries.

The baby cardinals grew and started exploring their world within the nest. One laundry day, while hanging clothes on the line, I peeked at the nest and saw one of the babies at the edge with its beak wide open, begging to be fed. I also noticed the nest was tilted down off the top of the crossbar. I tried to gently push it back in position without scaring the babies but couldn’t get it fully straightened up.

I went back to the house to shlep another load of laundry out. Back at the clothesline I checked the nest, found it tilted down again...and empty! If the babies tumbled out of the nest, they probably wouldn't survive the fall. I searched the ground around the post but couldn’t find them. Then I peered into the clematis jungle and saw one of them perched on a wire in the cot spring, about halfway down the post. I ran back to the house to get Bill. I’m not very knowledgeable about birds and he would know the best way to rescue it. He put on a glove, repositioned the nest, gently picked up the bird and returned it, cheeping shrilly, to the nest. The parents were frantically darting from tree to tree, squawking their distress with the handling of their baby. We never found the second baby.

No sooner had Bill placed the baby in its nest than it clumsily fluttered to the ground. Again, Bill picked it up and placed it back in the nest. This time it stayed put so we quickly left.

Bill thought the babies were too young for flight-training but, considering the instability of the nest, maybe the parents decided to start early.

A few minutes later, I looked out the window and saw a very small bird attempt a clumsy hop that barely got it off the ground, then flutter back down, flapping its tiny wings for all it was worth. After a few seconds of rest, it hopped airborne again to an altitude of a few inches, followed by another uncoordinated descent. Bill and I went back outside, thinking another rescue was necessary. Then we saw Daddy Cardinal in front of his flight-challenged offspring, flutter-hopping backwards and cheeping encouragement to “Keep trying; you’re almost there!” Now we understood: Because of the instability of their nest, the cardinals were moving their young—we hoped they’d already moved the one we couldn't find. We’re not sure where they set up housekeeping; but they headed toward a small tree with low branches and dense ground cover around it.

Several days have passed. Occasionally we still see the adult cardinals. We assume the flight-training has resumed and the parents will soon launch their young out into the world.

Pretend you hear the opening notes of the “Dragnet” TV show theme song:

Ladies and gentlemen, the story you are about to read is true. No names have been changed to protect the innocent.

Eleven months and one day after his original crime spree and subsequent capture four days later, Blackie, the black snake, slithered back to the scene of the crime, like the crack addict who can’t resist one more hit.  

On July 26, 2014, I posted the account of Blackie, suspected serial bluebird nest raider, at http://www.fromhighheelstogumboots.com/gumboot-tracks-blog/archives/07-2014. He was a snake of interest wanted for questioning in the disappearance of one nest of bluebird eggs and one nest of baby bluebirds. Also posted was this picture of him lurking in the peony bushes while casing the premises.

Blackie’s original crime spree ended with his capture in strategically-placed bird netting while attempting to raid another bluebird nest. When found, he was overcome from sun exposure but regained consciousness once he was freed from the netting. His claim of entrapment didn’t stand up in court. But Bill, judge, jury and potential executioner, chose leniency over a death sentence of immediate decapitation by hoe. Blackie was sentenced to lifetime community service of clearing out the rodents from a neighbor’s pasture.

It was Monday, June 8, 2015. The day was sunny, warm and breezy. We were in a temporary lull between rain storms. The ground was saturated, water was standing in fields, rivers and creeks were running high and, in some cases, above flood stage. Another siege of storms was due to move in later in the week.

So far this spring, I had not seen Blackie and assumed he emerged from hibernation and resumed his community service in the neighbor’s pasture. We’d had three successful broods of baby bluebirds and soon there would be three more. One of the early broods hatched in the house of the original crime scene, and another was due to hatch shortly. But on the evening of June 8th, as Bill and Cricket returned to the house from our evening walk—I walked a longer route and wasn’t with them—Bill found a black snake trapped in the bird netting. Blackie! Or a look-alike copycat predator.

Bill documented the crime scene with photos.

A few minutes later, I arrived at the scene and took over the photography duty while Bill used scissors to free Blackie from the netting.

As before, Blackie wasn’t moving but that didn’t mean he was dead. However, the telltale stench of death did, indicating he'd succumbed to sun and heat exposure several hours earlier.

Blackie’s nest-raiding crime spree came to a fatal end. He’d been pardoned from death by garden hoe and given the rare opportunity to turn his life around. Tragically, he just couldn’t overcome his addiction to bluebird eggs and babies.