The late spring into early summer months bring with it a plethora of nesting birds, one of the most well-known in the southwest being the robin. 

These songbirds sport grey plumage with a rust-coloured belly and have a diet consisting of insects.

Sarah Bradley, stewardship coordinator for the Nature Conservancy of Canada in Saskatchewan, hopes to encourage community members to be mindful of birds, such as robins, and their young.

"At this time of year, robins are really ramping up their nesting," she said. "Generally, from April until July they'll build a nest, you'll see them gathering nest material and that usually takes a couple of weeks."

After the eggs are laid, they'll be incubated for another couple of weeks; once the birds hatch, they'll spend another couple of weeks in their nest before they become fledglings and begin to explore.

"They don't just one day up and fly out of the nest, they spend a couple days hopping along the ground and the parents will continue to feed them," said Bradley. "So, if you see a fledgling on the ground don't panic, its parents are probably nearby, just leave it alone and give it some space."

Bradley notes that people can help robins by leaving their nests alone and planting native trees or shrubs that help act as protection and a place to find insects to eat.

"Ideally you want to minimize the interaction with a baby bird, if keeping your pets inside is an option, that's great," she added. "If the bird happens to be in your dog run and there's no avoiding it, you can gently scoop it up and place it in a safe location no more than a few feet away.

"It's a myth that once you touch a baby bird the parents will reject the bird, so that's not true, birds don't have a very good sense of smell."

Additionally, robins are protected under the Migratory Bird regulations in Canada, which means disturbing a nesting robin or its nest is illegal. 

Community members can install pigeon spikes to deter nesting if there are concerns about the location of the nests to avoid moving them.