Male Robin chasing his own fledglings away

Hi Jay, have notified our resident Robin expert to answer your post ... likely at work just now but will look in later!
Great that you have seen fledglings though!

Hi Wendy... "seen fledglings" is an understatement... A male Robin who I called Bob (very unoriginal I know), made friends with me last autumn, so has been very close to me ever since. Sitting on my knee to eat and sits there singing quietly to me and listening when I talk to him, so no surprise that he now lets me feed his chicks too... yesterday I had one on my head and one on my back and one on my arm!!! Only fleetingly, but they seem to use me as a tree and feeding station :-) I try not to feed them much as I know they need to learn, so the live mealworms I do give them I throw them into the soil.
All the birds seem to trust me here in my new garden, even a male blackbird who has a special call for me when he wants food, and to my surprise took me to where one of his chicks was stuck and sat there with his Mrs, and they both kept showing me where it was and sat there while I got it out... but that's another long story :-)
Have you heard of this type of thing before?

My goodness Jay, that is some trust, all sitting on your body and the clever blackbirds alerting you to the stuck chick. My Robin is getting rather cheeky but nowhere near sitting on me!

JayBirdJan said:

Have you heard of this type of thing before?

Hi again Jay, great to hear about your enviable close contact with the Robins ... there are posters here on CF who've come across very confusing Robins!

Just today I have a female BB visiting garden feeding dish & her mate too ... he's very nervous but she is bold as brass, my OH painting house this afternoon & her feeding about two feet away!  You must regale us with your account of rescuing BB chick now that you've whetted our appetites!

Thanks everyone for your comments... It's getting a bit late now so I will upload pics and video about my BBs asap :-)
Here's a few unanswered questions about Bob and co...
With regards to my male Robin Bob, he takes food from me as usual but when I throw the mealworms on the floor for the fledglings and they go to pick it up, he flies at them with so much fury... Does Bob not want me to feed them or for them not to have my/any food? It's not as though Bob is hungry but his Mrs "Bobbie" (I know, yet another bland name) is now sitting on her second clutch of eggs. Typically, she made her second nest in a non-camera box !!!
The other thing that might be an issue, is that I have a second pair of Robins in my garden: Loz and Lolo, who are also on their second brood (nesting very close together) and have started feeding their young (Bob and Bobbie are about a week behind). Loz is very blatent and will track me down in the garden for food, even into Bob's side of the garden, which winds him up terribly; especially when he sits on our garden swing seat that Bob thinks belongs to him - it's cool watching him on it, swaying slightly :-)
I also have 2 other male Robins (with families) who visit for food but are nesting just outside my garden but these rarely seem to clash. (yes they have names too; Flash and Jack). I have to name them all as I get mixed up with who's who - the same now with some of the Blackbirds; Beebz, Viv and Mama (pair) and a few others still to name... and the first youngsters from Loz and Lolo are now popping out of the hedges asking for an occasion mealworm :-) but too many to name now :-)
So as you can imagine, it's all going a bit barmy at the mo but I do love it :-) pics to follow.

Sounds great Jay, can't wait for tomorrow's update!

Sounds like you have a real soap opera going on in your garden although I imagine it's more interesting than the ones on telly :)

Unknown said:

This is Part 1

Was good to re-visit HTR, where have last three years gone?