Nuthatches May Have Claimed a Nest Box

Twice in the past week I have observed White Breasted Nuthatches at a large nest box I put up about a year ago. The WBNs are cavity nesters, so this would not be a surprising development. And the box in question had the best nest effort last year of all my boxes, although at the time Tufted Titmice were the claimants. So I naturally expected this same box to interest somebody in 2010. And the Nuthatch interest gives me some satisfaction that my pack-in-a-bunch-of-pine-shavings strategy might be paying off. That is, the birds expect to do some cavity excavation when establishing a nest, and so can happily remove my pine shavings and feel fulfilled. I'll have to inspect the foot of the tree to see if that's happening. The good news for me is that I did the same thing at three other boxes, so perhaps I'll have a little better luck with birds with this habit. I'm keeping an eye on that box. Hopefully the WBN's will carry out nesting plans there.