Build a Bird Nest Science Project

I’ve blogged about our science curriculum before because I absolutely love it! We are doing Exploring Creation Zoology Vol. 1: Flying Creatures of the Fifth Day from Apologia. The first half of the book is about birds. We just finished the chapter on “Nesting,” and today’s activity was to build a bird’s nest. Nest building should be pretty easy, right?

First, we went out back to observe the bird’s nest in our backyard. We did this in typical boy-fashion – we stood on top of the plastic Little Tykes slide which was stacked on top of the kiddie picnic table! (When I say “we,” I mean Aidan of course…)

Then we assembled our materials: leaves, grass, twigs, and mud. We spread out some waxed paper for a work surface. The book suggested starting with some mud. Did you know that birds use mud as well as their own saliva to hold the nest together? I didn’t!

Here is Gresham’s nest. We’ll call this a “pile” nest. He grabbed a couple handfuls of twigs, sprinkled some leaves on top, and was very happy with the result! (In fact, I was surprised how entertaining this was for him. I wasn’t really planning on him making a nest since this activity is way above him, but he had fun making a nest for his toy dinosaur!)

Aidan and I worked for 20 minutes on our nest, and never really got it to hold together very well! Maybe we needed some more grass? Or twigs that were more bendable? And we couldn’t even imagine trying to attach it to a tree! That was okay, though, because the point of the activity was to see how God has specially gifted birds to be able to build nests! They don’t have hands or fingers, and yet they build nests that hold up to storms and wind – yet another testimony to God’s power in creation!