These Precious Photos of Baby Birds Are Just What You Need

Dad and mom tending to their offspring are among the most lovable moments in nature, so it’s no marvel that photographers try to seize these interactions. Final yr, like another yr, the 2025 Audubon Images Awards acquired a powerful assortment of child fowl images that had us awwing at our screens. From adorably awkward American Woodcock fluffballs to shy swallow chicks in Chile, the next 15 pictures are a surprising showcase of avian household life throughout the Americas. 

All of those images had been captured at a secure and accountable distance, and in doing so, they provide us glimpses into moments of fascinating pure historical past each far and near residence. Though the photographs didn’t win any awards, they undoubtedly received our hearts. Ensure to take a look at the 2025 awards winners, honorable mentions, and Top 100 for extra dazzling shows. However within the meantime, prepare for a bombardment of cuteness.

Nice Horned Owl (above)

Surrounded by spindly Spanish moss, an grownup Nice Horned Owl naps with its owlet. This species is North America’s most widespread owl and one of many first to start out breeding—as early as late November in southern states like Florida, the place Alex Nelson captured this picture. Within the winter, pairs of Nice Horned Owls start to hoot to at least one one other, and the feminine spends greater than a month incubating the eggs. Younger go away the nest round 5 weeks after hatching and can spend one other 5 weeks screeching and clambering alongside tree branches till they will fly.

American Woodcock

Similar to adults, child American Woodcocks bob to the beat of their very own drum as they stroll throughout the forest flooring. These downy chicks go away the nest inside hours of hatching and are fed by their mom for the primary week of life. After that, they forage on their very own, bouncing alongside to fire up prey whereas probing their lengthy, little payments into the soil looking for earthworms and bugs. On this photograph, Andrew Tao captures a candy second between mom and chick, the place she holds a wormy meal she snagged from the leaf litter in her beak.

Wooden Stork

Wooden Storks nest in bustling waterbird colonies at wetlands in Florida and the Southeast. Firstly of the breeding season, these birds use giant sticks to assemble flimsy nests in mangrove bushes or cypress and can delicately line the within with leaves. Throughout the nest, storks will lay round three to 4 eggs, with 5, as pictured, being the utmost clutch measurement. Because the season goes on, new sticks could also be added to fortify the nest, which additionally turns into coated in guano, additional serving to to maintain the construction collectively. Younger storks are noisy and scraggly and can fledge at round eight weeks previous.
 

Baltimore Oriole

Though a lover of fruits and nectar, relating to feeding their chicks, grownup Baltimore Orioles principally depend on bugs. Feeding these younger birds beetles, moths, and grasshoppers snagged from the treetops provides them sufficient protein for them to develop. Whereas the feminine oriole is pictured right here, each mother and father assist increase the chicks. Younger birds develop up in a hanging pouch-like nest, woven primarily by the feminine, and can go away the nest about two weeks after hatching.

Sandhill Crane

A Sandhill Crane chick known as a colt—an apt identify since these birds are working and on their ft at a really younger age, as photographed right here by Tim Barker. Inside a day after hatching, colts observe their mother and father into marshy areas, the place each mother and father feed the younger fowl bugs, seeds, or different bite-sized meals. Younger cranes stick round their mother and father for 9 to 10 months, finally migrating with their household to their wintering grounds on the finish of the breeding season.

Crested Caracara

Though they seem like a hawk, caracaras are literally falcons. In actual fact, they’re the one species of falcon that collects nesting materials to assemble their cumbersome abodes, relying  on sticks, stems, vines, and different vegetation to construct a construction round two ft throughout in measurement. As soon as established, nests may be reused by pairs yr after yr, with the birds making repairs and including nesting supplies as vital. This Crested Caracara household, photographed by Isabel Guerra Clark, appears to have made its residence in a saguaro cactus, a keystone plant of the Sonoran Desert.

Chilean Swallow

A standard sight within the extra temperate reaches of Chile and Patagonia, the Chilean Swallow is a species that solely breeds in southern South America. Like many swallows, they nest in cavities close to water, both beneath the eaves of homes or in tree hollows, equivalent to one housing the 2 fledglings pictured right here. Contained in the cavity, Chilean Swallow nests are created from mud and lined with feathers, the place the feminine will lay a clutch of 4 to 6 eggs. A pair can increase two to 3 broods a season.

American Goldfinch

In the case of American Goldfinch chicks, the male takes on the majority of the work. He’s accountable for gathering meals when the chicks first hatch, whereas the feminine palms over the meals to the chicks. Over time, the male begins to provide the chicks meals immediately, and when the birds are near fledging, he’s the first caregiver. On this photograph, Sarah McDaniel captures the male goldfinch feeding three nestlings in a prairie in Illinois.
 

American Oystercatcher

Fuzzy oystercatcher chicks can go away the nest inside hours after they hatch. Within the first two months of their lives, each mother and father will carry the younger birds shellfish and worms and can loudly chase and harass predators. As they develop, the chicks will then begin to probe on their very own, foraging alongside the shorelines and utilizing their tan coloration as camouflage towards the sandy seashore. On this photograph, Matt Reitinger noticed two chicks taking part in, chasing one different and moving into chest-bumping tussles on a seashore in New Jersey.

American Robin

When American Robins first hatch, they’re blind, helpless, and coated in just a few wisps of white downy feathers. However over the course of a brief two weeks, these chicks endure a dramatic transformation. Each mother and father work diligently to assemble bugs and earthworms, nourishing their infants to allow them to sprout new feathers, develop their wings, and strengthen their muscle tissues. After they emerge from the nest, as this younger robin pictured right here has carried out, they’re the identical measurement as an grownup and might tentatively fly and forage on their very own.

Trumpeter Swan

The wetlands of Alaska, the place Hiresha Senanayake snapped this household photograph, hosts vital refuges for the Trumpeter Swan. It’s the place many swans, primarily ones from the Pacific coast, nest and breed, benefiting from the luxurious panorama’s considerable meals and security from predators. A swan pair can have as much as 9 cygnets (child swans), which may swim after they’re one-day previous. Household portraits like these was once uncommon, as Trumpeter Swans had been thought of endangered within the mid-1900s after they underwent a precipitous decline. However because of searching rules and habitat safety, the species has made a miraculous rebound.

Roseate Spoonbill

A newly hatched Roseate Spoonbill might seem somewhat bit like a dinosaur. Its invoice is lengthy, thick, and vaguely spoonlike, and a layer of white downy feathers covers its pale pink pores and skin. Like many child birds, a spoonbills’ food plan consists of regurgitated meals, on this case of small fish and crustaceans that the adults scooped up from close by waters. The chick will stay within the nest for a few month, till they climb onto close by foliage and eventually fledge at six weeks previous.
 

California Quail

A clutch for a California Quail is normally round 13 to 14 eggs, and after they hatch, giant teams of chicks may be seen following the adults round. Throughout the morning and night, quails spend a lot of their time on the bottom, foraging for seeds and different grains. However when they should relaxation, they roost within the security of bushes. For this photograph, Robert Groos got here throughout six two-week-old quail chicks getting comfy on a fallen oak department on his property.

Golden-plumed Parakeet

An extended-tailed parrot discovered excessive within the Andes, the Golden-plumed Parakeet is often nomadic, wandering the cloud forests in giant, rowdy teams. Nonetheless, as soon as they begin nesting, the parakeets will stick to at least one place for a number of months. These birds are cavity nesters, as seen on this photograph taken by Santiago Palacios Salazar in Colombia, and have been famous to have an affinity for hollows in wax palm bushes. As soon as the chicks hatch, each female and male parakeets care for his or her younger, feeding them three to 4 instances a day whereas shrilly calling to at least one one other when returning to the nest.

Laysan Albatross

Flying, for a Laysan Albatross chick, is hard enterprise. Earlier than they fledge at round six months previous, these birds can spend weeks vigorously flapping, working into the wind, and practising little hops to grasp the elevate of their giant wings. As soon as aloft, it might be a very long time earlier than an albatross sees land once more: Younger albatrosses spend their first three or 4 years residing at sea, solely returning to their delivery islands when they’re prepared to lift households of their very own. The birds nest in only a few distant islands on the earth, together with on Kauai, Hawaii, which is the place Alex Eisengart took this photograph.