The Palo Alto Baylands Nature Preserve is home to a variety of bird species, one of which is the Long-Billed Marsh Wren. If you have ever walked close to the salt marsh, youíve probably noticed a perky little bird fluttering about and bursting with songóyou have most likely spotted the Long-Billed Marsh Wren.

The Long-Billed Marsh Wren (Telmatodytes palustris)*, also known as the Marsh Wren, Reed Wren, and the Salt-Water Marsh Wren, is a highly energetic little bird that dwells in salt marshes. Its upper body is mostly brown and dull black, with occasional streaks of white. The under-areas are more or less white and pale brown. This brown-eyed bird measures 5 inches long and has a slender, curved beak approximately the length of its head. Its tail, which is about the size of its wings, is cocked up high when the bird is excited.

Long-Billed Marsh Wrens are distributed throughout the east and west coasts of the United States. In California, they are frequently seen during both summer and winter time on migratory trips. Many subspecies exist and this determines its seasonal status and distribution. From March through May, there is a general northward movement of population, while a southward movement is seen from September to November. These wrens usually establish breeding habitats in freshwater and brackish marshes fraught with cattails, rushes, sedges, and reeds. During the winter migrating season, these birds often establish themselves in coastal tidal salt marshes.

A distinctive feature of all Wrens, including the Long-billed Marsh Wren, is their talent for singing. Eager to flaunt their vocal prowess, they sing frequently during both day and night. Their call resembles something of a tsu-tsu-tsu-tsuck sound. Their songs consists of a series of gurgling noises, then a trill, and closes with a gug-gug-gug-dr-r-r-r-r-di-di-di-di-di finale. Marsh Wrens are known to be polygamous, and their singing activity is correlated with their polygamous mating pattern. As opposed to monogamous bird species, whose singing activity decreases after mating, the male marsh wrens increase their singing activity after mating in an effort to attract more females.

The nests built by Long-Billed Marsh Wrens are globular in shape and are often appended to hidden areas on cattails, bulrushes, and other reeds. Nests are constructed from moist reeds and grass and contain a side entrance. Five to nine eggs are usually laid in one nest. Eggs are generally brown, but are occasionally dull gray or pinkish and mottled by dark brown spots. An incubation period of 13-14 days is usually required for hatching. The young are fed soft-bodied marsh insects. Only after 11-16 days do the fledglingsí wings develop the capacity for flight.

Several nests are often constructed by the male while the female nests. Several suggestions have been proposed to explain this oddity. Some suggest that nests are often rebuilt at the instant an intruder comes into contact with the nest, even if no damage is done. Another explanation proposes that numerous dummy nests are built as a trick to confuse predators as to where the real nest is located among the myriad of imitations. Yet another explanation suggests that during the female nesting period, the male is so full of vitality, it relieves its excessive energy by frantic nest-building. Whichever theory is correct, this nest-building frenzy is not unique to only the Marsh-billed Wren, but is characteristic of other Wrens as well.

*Apparently, there are two scientific names for the Long-Billed Marsh Wren: Cistothorus palustris and Talmatodytes palustris.