For the last two months, the Project Phoebe has been hard at work collecting data for our third and final field season. At the start of the season, we thoroughly surveyed all of our nest sites from 2025 to see which nests had fallen down over the winter. Although Phoebe nests fall pretty regularly, both […]
The 2024 Project Phoebe field season officially wrapped up last week! We want to give a heartfelt thank you to all the site managers and community members who supported our research efforts. And a huge thank you to the wonderful team of undergraduates involved in the project. Our work would not be possible without all […]
Project Phoebe’s field season has now passed its busiest point — late May / early June, when most of our Phoebe pairs (a male and a female that raise young together) are caring for their chicks. So far this season, we have been tracking the activity and success of 56 Phoebe pairs, many of whom […]
Project Phoebe’s second field season has gotten off to a very early start! By the end of March, we were already monitoring 26 nests with eggs or chicks (compared to 1 nest at this time last). This has left us wondering–did the Phoebes start breeding earlier this year? Or have we just gotten much better […]
Check in with our team as we get started on our second season of fieldwork! Learn about our new “nest shelf” program and what we’ve seen so in the field so far.
Project Phoebe is about three months into its first field season. Adorable baby Phoebes have fledged (left the nest) at a handful of our nests, and some parents have already laid a second round of eggs! Other Phoebe pairs are just laying their first round of eggs. To better understand how city life affects Phoebe […]
Several of our Phoebe nests now have nestlings! When these babies hatch, they are tiny, mostly featherless, and helpless. The parents brood them to keep them warm and bring them insects to eat. The nestlings quickly grow to their adult size (17-22 grams), and they are ready to leave the nest in about three weeks […]
We are now a little over one month into Project Phoebe’s first field season, and several of our Phoebe pairs have laid eggs! After constructing and meticulously lining their mud nests with soft grasses, a female Phoebe lays 1 to 6 eggs that range from pure white to lightly spotted around one end. She typically […]
Project Phoebe’s fieldwork begin a few weeks ago and is off to a great start! Our team members have been out looking for breeding pairs of Phoebes and new nests all over Davis, Woodland, West Sacramento, and more. We have found lots of old mud cup nests, which may be used again this year. Constructing […]
We anticipate that we will be starting out field activities the week of February 27th, and everyone on the crew is beyond excited! So much thought and coordination has gone into this project behind the scenes over the past year at least, so being this close to the proper start of the first field season […]
