American Dipper flying up inside the nest

In the top two pics the American Dipper parent is flying up toward the entrance to its nest. As the parent approached the nest I could hear the nestlings calling inside the nest. In the bottom pic the dipper is partially inside the nest. Sometimes the parent would feed the nestlings while hovering briefly with it's head inside the nest while other times it would go completely inside of the nest.
SeEtta

American Dipper and nest

I was amazed to find that the American Dipper nest under the Texas Creek bridge over the Arkansas River (at the entrance to the Texas Creek BLM Rec Site) was occupied. I had found this nest earlier this spring before the early and extended run-off made it difficult for American Dippers to feed (all the boulders they usually perch on were underwater and the river was running very fast with no shallow water in this area). Additionally this nest was quite low and I thought it might be inundated (bottom pic shows nest location). Most of the dipper nests I have seen were near the top of the bridge supports, usually right under the bottom of the bridge. I watched as a parent flew to the bridge support and looked towards the nest as shown in the top pic. The entrance for dipper nests is at the side but in this case the nest overlaps the entrance so the birds have to fly down below the nest then fly up into them for entry.
I'll post more pics of the dipper flying up into the nest in next post. SeEtta

Nesting American Dippers

Yesterday I checked some areas in Western Fremont County where I have been monitoring breeding American Dippers. Though the Colorado Breeding Bird Atlas, which was published in 1998, didn't find occupied nests until May I believe they nest earlier than that--at least along the Arkansas River west of Canon City.

My first stop was the Texas Creek bridge. I found a pair of American Dippers that sang some and clearly (by the amount of droppings on the rocks by the bridge) had been spending a lot of time near that bridge. Though I couldn't locate a nest under it, it is quite possible there is one being built there as it is impossible to see under most of this bridge.

I drove further upstream and checked the Valle Bridge. That is where I found the nest and the American Dipper in these photos. It appears complete though I wouldn't venture to say if there was any further interior work remaining.

SeEtta