Animals in Park Pavilions

     I've been in park pavilions many times over the years and have been amazed by the number of animals that benefit from those open, outdoor structures, most of which are in woodlands.  Pavilions provide shelter for those creatures, and human-made food to some species. 
     Most of the creatures in pavilions are either birds or invertebrates.  But all of them are adaptable, and common as species.  And all of them provide interest, if one is open to that type of entertainment.
     Gray squirrels, eastern chipmunks and a few kinds of birds enter pavilions during the day, often when people are in them, to eat crumbs and other edibles left behind on tables and floors by humans.  The birds include starlings, American crows and song sparrows the year around, chipping sparrows in summer and yellow-rumped warblers in winter.  The sparrows and yellow-rumps also eat some of the invertebrates they find in pavilions.  None of the mammals and birds want to bother anybody.  They are there only to get easy meals.
     Some kinds of native birds, including eastern phoebes, American robins, Carolina wrens and mourning doves, nest on the support beams under pavilion roofs.  Phoebes traditionally nest on rock ledges, under sheltering, over-hanging boulders near water in woods.  To phoebes, support beams are rock ledges and roofs are overhanging boulders so they raise young in pavilions, porches and other outdoor structures of that type. 
     The adaptable robins, Carolina wrens and mourning doves also hatch offspring on support beams in pavilions.  All these birds are interesting to experience, but please leave them alone.  After all, they are protected by law.
     Little brown bats could hang out by day under the roofs of pavilions during summer, but I haven't seen that yet.  Again, the bats are only seeking a daytime shelter between their feeding on insects at night.  Try to leave them alone, too.    
     Some of the more common invertebrates that live in pavilions are carpenter ants and other kinds of ants, carpenter bees, paper wasps, mud-dauber wasps and a small variety of spiders.  Female carpenter bees chew round holes in the sides of the wooden beams.  Each one stuffs a ball of flower nectar and pollen in each compartment she made in her cavity so that her larva that hatches in each section will have food to grow, pupae and emerge as an adult bee.
     Paper wasps and mud-dauber wasps build their nurseries on the ceilings and support beams of pavilions.  Paper wasps chew wood and make several six-sided cells in a cluster that is attached by a single, thin stem to a structure.  Mud-daubers collect mud and plaster it to structures, producing a few nurseries, side by side, that resemble tiny organ pipes.  There those wasps rear their offspring.
     The various kinds of spiders spin their webs from beams and ceilings to snare flies and other flying insects.  Spider webs are engineering marvels and pretty to see at times, but some of them are a nuisance in a pavilion during summer when those pavilions are most likely to be used.
     These are my own observations of life in pavilions, most of which are in woods.  The reader may have had other experiences with wildlife in a pavilion.