A few miles away the brown headed female Cowbird had a great idea. Her great idea was to lay her eggs in the Kirtland family's nest. She was very slothful so she did not feel like building her own nest.

One day just before the break of dawn, while the Kirtlands were away to get their breakfast of minute insects, the sneaky Cowbird snuck into Mama’s nest. She began to lay her eggs secretly in Mama’s nest. She laid a few eggs and as soon as she heard the sound of the Kirtland family, she quickly flew away from there.

When the Kirtlands came back, mama saw three peculiar looking eggs in the nest covering her own eggs. She said, "These eggs do not look like my own eggs!"

Then papa said, "Hey what if these are that lazy Cowbird’s eggs?" After lunch, Mama Kirtland flew over to the Cowbird’s house. She found Cowbird asleep. Mama Kirtland woke Cowbird and gave her the eggs. The Cowbird hastily took back her eggs.

Mama started squawking and yelling at the Cowbird that even you would become suspicious! She was telling her to build her own nest and take care of her own eggs. The Cowbird said that she did not know how to build a nest. Mama agreed to help the Cowbird build a nest. Now Mama Kirtland protects her eggs day and night until they are hatched.

Other warblers like these notice the eggs and eject them from the nest except they do not give the eggs back. Since there are only about one thousand of these songbirds left in the world, park rangers set up traps for the Cowbirds, because the Cowbirds are the mortal enemies of these types of warblers