Two species of birds decided to build nests on our house this spring. One built a nest on top of an electrical box under the porch. The other built on a pair of floodlights on the garage. They were both good sites, because they were sheltered from weather. Neither was a good site, because we have outdoor cats, and one in particular (that would be Sylvester) is a little killing machine.

They were probably the same birds that nested, or tried to nest, on the house last year. Last year I was able to keep one from nesting on the floodlights by climbing a ladder and destroying the nest before it could be completed. Unfortunately, with a bad knee and a bad shoulder, I couldn’t do that this year. So we had a successful nest construction on the floodlights, and a successful egg laying.

I don’t know what happened to the birds under the porch. If it was like last year, the baby birds were killed on the ground. But I think the birds that came from the nest on the floodlights might have made it.

I’m not sure what kind of birds they were. I tentatively identified them as swifts, but I never got a close enough look at the adults. Here they were a few days ago.

There are three birds big enough that they barely fit into the nest. From what I can tell, swifts fly directly out of the nest when they fledge. One day they were chirping away in the nest, and the next day they were gone. I looked for feathers on the ground, a sure sign that a cat had found them on the driveway, but there was nothing below the nest but bird droppings. So I am hopeful that they made it safely away.

I don’t mind the mess they make on the floodlights, or on the driveway, but I worry about them too much to let them nest there again. Once I’m sure enough of my physical condition to climb a ladder, I plan to tear the nest down and put up some kind of screen to keep them from nesting there again. Same with the nest under the porch.

And, speaking of my condition, my shoulder has improved greatly. I don’t have the full range of motion that I used to have, but the physical therapist thinks I will eventually reach that point. My knee is slowly getting better, but it’s not there yet. The therapist thinks my knee will get back to normal, or very close to it. Apparently the two most difficult recoveries for injuries to the knee at a broken kneecap and torn quadriceps tendons. Fortunately, I didn’t break my kneecap, but I did a good job tearing the tendons. The limiting factor for me may be arthritis in my knee.

As for Leah, she is now scheduled for L4-L5 spinal fusion on July 19. She is ambiguous about the whole thing; she dreads the surgery, but she wants to get it over with. Several people who have had similar surgeries have told her that their surgeries significantly reduced their pain. It’s surprising how many people we run into who have had spinal surgery.