Field journal from a sunroom bookshelf
A House Finch nest, day by day.
Five chicks, three cameras, and a field journal an AI wrote every morning from courtship feeding through fledge. Thirty-one daily logs and eleven prose dispatches across the full cycle.
- Nest day
- 31
- Daily logs
- 31
- Latest
- May 25
Day 31Start here
What you're looking at
A pair of House Finches built a nest on a sunroom bookshelf in late April 2026. Three cameras have been on it ever since. Every clip runs through an AI classifier that tags what's happening — incubating, feeding, chicks visible, empty cup — and the daily logs in the archive are written from that data by Claude Sonnet 4.6. The prose dispatches are written by Claude too, when a day earns one. This isn't a finished story: the chicks are on the edge of fledge as you read this. Three good places to start:
Turning point
Hatch Day, Days Early
May 7 — the morning the eggs became chicks, days ahead of the predicted window.
Best dispatch
Four Chicks, Maybe Five
The first real count, and an honest accounting of what the classifier sees vs. what's actually in the cup.
The data
The Story So Far
29 days of camera data in charts: phase timeline, fledge-watch ladder, brood-to-independence arc.
Current observation
Day 31 — Nest empty throughout daylight; brief overnight visits only
From midnight through ~00:20, interval clips show the cup empty. At 00:33, a bird is in the cup (sunroom_interval), but the tapo interval three minutes later shows it already gone. Two more brief occupancies follow at 02:22 and 02:38 — bird visible on …
Archive
Field notes in reverse order
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Day 31
Day 31 — Nest empty throughout daylight; brief overnight visits only
From midnight through ~00:20, interval clips show the cup empty. At 00:33, a bird is in the cup (sunroom_interval), but the tapo interval three minutes later shows it already gone. Two more …
Dispatch
Day 30Day 30 — Chicks seen outside cup on bookshelf; both parents feeding; nest empty by mid-afternoon
Through the overnight hours, tapo close-camera intervals show chicks filling the cup unbrooded across most checks. Adult brooding visits appear at roughly 00:40, 01:08–01:11, 01:34–01:42, …
Day 29Day 29 — Chicks climbing onto shelf; five-count confirmed; both adults feeding
Overnight, the adult broods in short, irregular stints rather than continuously. Interval clips through the night confirm a repeating on/off pattern — the adult settles in the cup for a few …
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Dispatch
Outgrowing the Cup: Five Fledglings on Day 28
Field Journal — House Finch Nest, 22 May 2026 The cup has not changed since hatch. Five birds have. The vessel that once held five pale eggs and one adult now contains five well-feathered …
Day 28Day 28 — Active feeding by both adults; full clutch of 5 visible simultaneously
Through the overnight hours the female alternated between brooding bouts and leaving the chicks unattended in the cup. During uncovered stretches, 3–4 chicks were visible and largely still. …
DispatchFive Nestlings Fill the Cup and Begin to Overflow
These three days form a single continuous arc — not three separate ledger entries but one long sentence of growth that only the gaps between pages obscure. When I sit with the full sequence …
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Day 27
Day 27 — Active feeding throughout; chicks beginning to overflow cup onto shelf
Overnight the female alternated frequently between sitting on the cup and being absent — chicks visible alone in IR through most of the midnight hours. At 00:29, two adults were present at …
Day 26Day 26 — Both adults feeding regularly; 5 chicks confirmed; debris accumulating
Overnight from midnight, the female was on the nest in brooding bouts interrupted by brief gaps — typically a minute or two — during which 3–4 chicks were visible huddled in the cup. The …
Day 25Day 25 — Both adults feeding regularly; 5 chicks visible in single clip
Overnight, the female brooded steadily in infrared. Brief absences occurred at 00:21, 00:35–00:41, and several other short gaps through ~02:30; chicks are visible huddling in the cup during …
DispatchRelay Feeding and Overnight Brooding: Three Days in the Cup
The three days from Saturday through Monday resolve into a single legible rhythm: female on the cup from roughly 20:30 each night until first light, dawn handoff to both adults, a relay …
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Day 24
Day 24 — Regular feeding by both adults; female on nest overnight
From midnight through dawn the female brooded with only scattered short absences — gaps at 01:18, 01:33, 02:08, 02:48, 03:24, and around 05:32–05:43, each lasting a minute or two. During …
Day 23Day 23 — Sustained feeding by both adults; possible unhatched eggs still present
Female on the nest continuously from midnight through approximately 05:50, with brief absences recurring throughout the night — chicks visible in the exposed cup during most gaps. At 05:56 …
Day 22Day 22 — High feeding rate by both parents; 6 chicks counted in one evening clip
Overnight, the female alternated rapidly between sitting on the cup and brief absences, with chicks visible in uncovered clips throughout. The cycling — a brooding clip followed within a …
DispatchFive Chicks, Two Pale Ovals, Three Days of Provisioning
May 13–15, 2026 · Wednesday through Friday Three days ago the nest cup still held secrets. By May 15 it holds five small bodies that shift and gape and press against each other without …
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Day 21
Day 21 — Day N — Fragmented overnight brooding; sustained male provisioning
Through midnight to roughly 05:00, the female is repeatedly on and off the nest. Brooding clips appear at 00:32, 00:52–00:54, 00:57, 00:59, 01:12, 01:19, 01:25–01:35, 01:40, and at scattered …
Day 20Day 20 — High feeding-visit rate; possible unhatched egg(s) visible at dusk
Overnight through approximately 05:45, the female brooded without significant gaps. Chick shapes — pale, rounded forms — were visible in infrared alongside her through most of the night. …
DispatchAsynchrony and Provisioning: Three Days Inside the Finch Nest
Three days bracket a transition I have been waiting weeks to see resolve. On May 11 the cup still held both naked chicks and unhatched eggs; by the evening of May 13, the family had settled …
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Day 19
Day 19 — Frequent male feeding visits; 5 chicks visible; possible unhatched eggs noted
Female on the nest from midnight. Chicks visible in multiple overnight IR clips—small pale shapes beside her in the cup. No recorded absences during the night. At 05:56, a brief gap shows …
DispatchFrom Pale Eggs to Gaping Chicks: Three Days at the Nest
The three days folded into a single, cohesive story the moment I spread the footage logs across the table. What struck me first was not any single event but a structural tension: the nest on …
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Day 18
Day 18 — Chicks visible in daylight; up to 4 confirmed; 3 unhatched eggs still in cup at 10:51
The female broods without interruption overnight. Chicks appear in IR clips from 02:51 onward—pale rounded shapes at the cup edge when she shifts—and recur in a dozen or more clips through …
Day 17Day 17 — Up to 4 chicks; unhatched eggs still in cup at ~16:00; male feeds throughout
The Tapo camera’s overnight interval frames are almost entirely unreadable — fully dark from 00:00 through at least 05:19. A bird is confirmed on the nest in IR at 01:27; a brief …
Day 16Day 16 — Regular male feeding visits throughout; 4 chicks confirmed in single frame
Female on the nest at 02:00, continuous overnight. At 06:17 she departs; the cup is empty at 07:08. At 07:32 she is on the shelf beside the nest, facing the cup. A male enters the cup …
DispatchThree Days of Hatch: One Egg Lingers in the Cup
The middle days of May produced the most consequential footage this nest camera has yet recorded — not a single decisive moment but a protracted negotiation between the old state of the nest …
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Day 15
Day 15 — Regular male feeding visits; 4 chicks confirmed; apparent unhatched egg
Female on nest continuously through the overnight period. First departure of the day at 05:58 briefly reveals 2 chicks in the cup; she is back within a minute. A second short absence around …
DispatchFour Chicks, Maybe Five
Day one for the chicks. The female sat through the night without leaving the cup, the male picked up his new provisioning rhythm at first light, and the count came into focus through the …
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Day 14
Day 14 — Day N — First full day with chicks; multiple feedings, one egg still in the cup
The female sits the nest continuously through the overnight hours, visible in monochrome IR on both Tapo and sunroom cameras from 00:13 onward. Position shifts are minor and the cup contents …
DispatchHatch Day, Days Early
The hatch was supposed to be next week. Going by a 13–14 day House Finch incubation and a clutch finished around April 25–26, the window I was watching for was May 11 through May 14. …
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Day 13
Day 13 — Day N — Hatch confirmed; chicks visible from dawn
The overnight clips begin as steady incubation, with the female settled low in the cup through the early morning. At 06:13, the first clear hatch evidence appears: a Tapo motion clip shows …
DispatchFrom Five Pale Eggs to First Chicks: Three Days' Watch
Monday the fourth arrives with the clutch already deep into incubation—Day 8 by my reckoning—and the female has not wavered. She rode out the night tucked tight in the cup, shifting only …
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Day 12
Day 12 — Day N — Steady incubation; courtship feeding visits cluster mid-morning and late afternoon
Through the overnight hours and into early morning, the female stays on the nest cup almost continuously, visible in IR across both Tapo and sunroom interval cameras. A brief gap appears at …
Day 11Day 11 — A day of steady incubation and attentive male visits.
ties# Day N — Continuous overnight incubation; brief nest absence around dawn 2026-05-05 · Tuesday Through the overnight hours, the female is on the nest continuously. From 00:04 onward, …
Day 10Day 10 — Steady incubation; frequent male nest visits; brief human disturbance
Continuous overnight incubation through 06:00. At 06:17, the cup was briefly empty with all five eggs visible before the female returned and settled. The morning continued with steady …
DispatchThe Male Keeps Returning to the Cup, Day After Day
Three days into close observation of the House Finch nest in the sunroom, the clearest thread running through the record is not the female’s steady incubation — that is expected — but …
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Day 9
Day 9 — Frequent male visits, two unusual events at midday
The female is on the nest at 02:00 and the next clip isn’t until 08:37, when a red male perches on the adjacent book while she sits. Similar visits at 09:29, 10:26, 10:27, 11:42, and …
Day 8Day 8 — Day N — Steady incubation with one courtship feeding and a brief human visit
By 10:55 the female is on the nest, deep in the cup. A short midday gap follows — at 11:52 the cup is briefly empty with one egg visible — before she returns by 11:54, partly hidden behind …
Day 7Day 7 — Day N — Frequent male visits during female's morning recesses
Overnight incubation was steady but interrupted. Between 00:00 and 06:00, the female cycled on and off in roughly 15–45 minute increments, with empty stretches at 00:45–01:00, 02:00–02:30, …
DispatchFemale Holds the Cup While the Male Keeps Returning
April 28–30, 2026 · Bookshelf nest, House Finch pair The Pattern Before the Detail Three days of data, collected across a camera transition, two observers (one biological, one electronic), …
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Day 6
Day 6 — A brief morning visit before an empty nest.
The day’s activity begins with the male visiting the incubating female at the nest. A short while later, the female takes a break, leaving the single egg unattended in the nest cup. …
Day 5Day 5 — Day N — Female incubation steady; male nest visits at midday
By 06:11 the female is on the cup. She lifts off twice in the next half hour — at 06:16 and 06:36 the nest sits empty with two eggs visible from the camera angle — and returns at 06:38 to …
Day 4Day 4 — Frequent short reliefs; camera work mid-afternoon clears the nest
The female is on the eggs at 06:00 and 06:03, gone by 06:39. The cup sits empty through the early morning until 08:23, when she arrives, settles briefly, and departs. The morning runs as a …
DispatchSix Eggs in the Cup: Three Days on the Bookshelf Nest
Some nests announce themselves. This one hid inside a domestic interior, its dried-grass cup wedged between a dark spine — a copy of Shoe Dog standing as a windbreak — and the white wall of …
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Day 3
Day 3 — Frequent short reliefs; male visits the nest area at 10:17
Pre-dawn coverage starts with the female on the nest at 06:16 and 06:23, shifting briefly to expose the eggs. She’s off by 06:28, and the empty cup with all five eggs is visible across …
Day 2Day 2 — Sparse incubation, brief midday human disturbance
Five eggs visible in the cup throughout the day. Coverage is sparse — most clips show the nest empty. Early morning, the cup is unattended at 06:22 and 06:23. At 06:41 a male perches on the …
Day 1Day 1 — Sparse iPhone coverage; female on nest by evening
Coverage today is mostly hand-held iPhone shots, with one clip from the bookshelf camera at the end of the day. A short burst of iPhone photos around 16:06 shows the nest empty. Egg counts …