Bye-bye, birdies

When I took the dogs out this morning, one of the baby robins was sitting on the porch ledge. I had about 2 seconds to admire him before Timber spotted him and charged, and he bailed out into the front yard. Timber went after him, and god bless the boy, he stopped, turned around, and came back to me when I hollered "TIMBER NO! Timber, come 'ere!"

It looked like he was out of range, and the Ts had to potty, so I put their collars on and let them go. As soon as they hit the yard, the parents started yelling and dive-bombing, and the other baby got upset and bailed out of the nest, into the yard, where both Ts immediately spotted her. And bless their hearts, both of them stopped when I called them and came back up onto the porch.

I'm not sure either of them actually got to go potty--lots of adrenaline pumping. I'm glad I got to see the babies so close before they left, but I do wish they hadn't had quite such a traumatic beginning to their lives out of the nest, poor things!

I was going to pull the nest down, but a couple of people have suggested that I leave it up for a while and see if the parents reuse it. If they haven't been too freaked out, that is!