A few days ago I went for a nature walk in Forstenrieder forest. I discovered a new area where I never went to before. It is very dense in terms of trees and bushes, fewer paths, and some places are wilder where it is very difficult to walk and see-through.Thus, I realized there are many more birds singing and in general many more tracks and signs left by different animal species. A little paradise!

While walking, I discovered various bird nests, some old and used from last year and others are new ones just built. Two of these last ones have got my attention. One nest is of a couple of Blackbirds and the other one is of a couple of Song thrushes. How did I recognize the bird species builders?

Both species build nests in this forest at a height between 1.50 up to 2.50 meters from the ground, both are ‘cup’ shaped and their diameter is of an average of 10 centimeters. Both species build the nests using twigs, branches of 2-4 mm of diameter, dried leaves that are bent around the nest and tangled with each other. The Song thrushes seem to use more dried long leaves and sometimes the blackbird mixes mud in between twigs and leaves. Both are camouflaged using (in this forest) mainly the same material, such as fresh green moss. But the main difference is inside the nest! The Blackbird nest is made with very small twigs of 1-2 mm of diameter, sometimes fine plant roots and dried long herbs to make the inside of the nest very soft. Instead, the Song thrush nest cup is often deeper and it is built with mud mixed with saliva (and dry grass). Thus, the nest cup is hard and has light brown color (it is dark brown or black when it is old and used). The function of this is to make the nest more solid.