Falling for the Marsh Wren

In the Spring of 2019, I spent a little over a month with a family of Burrowing Owls. There was something about these birds that made me want to devote the time to documenting the pairing-off, mating, birth and rearing of the young. From the very first picture of one of these owls that I had seen years before, I knew that this was a creature I would fall in love with.

This Spring, I had no particular species in mind and followed the whims of the weather and my personal schedule to photograph any and everything that I could as I reacquainted myself with my home state. In the process of this, I found myself with a new love affair (sorry Owls). On a cold morning in early Spring, I was walking in my local wetland sanctuary and found what I later determined to be Marsh Wren nests in the reeds. With curiosity piqued, I started to go out of my way to visit this nest each time I was at the wetlands to see the progress of the nest, if any. You can imagine the joy I felt when I finally captured images of the young a few weeks later! Since that day, I have continued to visit the nesting area and photograph the Wren family.

What a peculiar little bird! Known to bee normally quite shy, this one particular male would climb the highest reeds and sing its heart out. He must feel very safe here as normal behavior is for them to sing from the bottom of the reed stalks, only coming up to look for predators. I just had to take advantage of this and have since spent many mornings going to visit my little Wren friends. This is a collection of my favorite images from these adventures.

Be sure to click on each image to see it in its intended crop.