Nests, eggs, young and adults of native birds are protected by law . Even if they chose to nest in inconvenient locations, it is illegal to disturb an active nest without a permit.

House Finches often build nests in wreaths on a door. They occasionally use a nestbox. (I have one that nests in my metal Purple Martin house.) American Robins also have blue eggs and sometimes nest on wreaths.

Above: Not all blue eggs are bluebird eggs! Photo by Margot Prymas, of Ohio, taken in April 2010 of a different House Finch nest built on top of a wreath. The three eggs to the left are House Finch eggs. The two on the right are Cowbird eggs. Cowbirds are parasitic birds that remove an egg and lay their eggs in other birds nests. Read more about Cowbirds . Usually there is only one Cowbird egg per host nest - these eggs could have been laid by two different birds, or the cowbird may have been unable to find another host.

Previous Pictures of the Week: © Original photographs are copyrighted, and may not be used without the permission of the photographer. Please honor their copyright protection. If you would like to use a photo for educational purposes, you can contact me .

You cannot begin to preserve any species of animal unless you preserve the habitat in which it dwells. Disturb or destroy that habitat and you will exterminate the species as surely as if you had shot it. So conservation means that [we] have to preserve forest and grassland, river and lake, even the sea itself. This is vital not only for the preservation of animal life generally, but for the future existence of man himself—a point that seems to escape many people. -Gerald Durrell, The Nature Conservancy