Welcome Carolina wrens with a wreath
A friend said she’d just hung her Christmas wreath on the front door and has already seen a little brown bird going in and out of the wreath’s entwined branches and evergreen leaves.
“Maybe the bird’s ready for Christmas,” I said jokingly. Several readers have reported the same kind of bird snuggling into their fresh Christmas wreaths.
What they’re seeing is a Carolina wren. Probably not a solo wren but two birds, a male and female that nested this past spring and summer near a home with a door wreath.
Carolina wrens are quintessential homebodies, never going far from where they raised their chicks. Nor do they part company after rearing chicks because monogamy to them means staying together through all the seasons. Splitting up is virtually unheard of.
During the breeding season, wrens will nest in tree cavities, nest boxes, wornout shoes in a garage, boxes of stray nuts and bolts in a tool shed, and hanging flower baskets. During the nonbreeding season, they seek out roosting sites in dense tangles of vines and twigs
where they can snuggle for the winter.
But there’s nothing like a winter home in a Christmas wreath hanging on a door.
The wreath offers the birds an excellent shelter with warmth from a heated house plus security against predators like owls and cats. Meanwhile, the wrens enjoy a buffet of insects invariably crawling around the wreath.
But the cozy wreath comes with aggravations. People in the house keep opening the door, coming and going, yakking to each other like blue jays and letting other people crowd through the door like flocks of cackling geese.
The wrens might think people in the house have settled down after ripping open boxes of presents. Not to be. In a week, the birds will have to endure people partying until midnight and yelling Happy New Year.
Not to mention earsplitting fireworks sounding like shotgun blasts, which at least make the wrens glad they’re not geese.
A few years ago, my wife Kathy and I hosted wrens in a wreath on our front door. We’d watch them huddle together like a wad of brown feathers at the bottom of the garland.
We protected the wrens by asking friends and family to enter our home quietly. We told people the birds stick together for life. Aren’t families sticking together one of the blessings of the season?