Bird Feeding Tips: Beyond what most folks tell you

I like to feed wild birds. It's like having a giant aquarium, with aerial battles and better sound effects than an aquarium pump and bubbler. I haven't fed wild birds in a long time. Setting up my feeders reminded me of a bunch of stuff:

When you start out, don't expect a lot of birds, even if you see them all over the place. They not only need to find the feeder, but learn to trust it. If you think about it, a bird feeder is a very weird, unnatural thing. Give them time to figure it out and learn that it's not evil or some sort of bizarre trap.

When you first put out the bird feeder, don't fill it all the way, and prepare yourself for the possibility that the seed may go bad before enough birds come in to finish it. Always clean out the feeder if seeds have gotten moldy inside, and dry it out with a hairdryer before putting in more seed, or the mold will just come back and spoil seed that might have lasted much longer if you'd cleaned out the feeder well in the first place. Not only will birds avoid spoiled seed, but if they're desperate enough to eat it, they can get sick, possibly die, and it can cause problems that prevent them from raising chicks, or kill chicks that they're trying to keep fed. Anyway, unless you have someone else close by who is also feeding birds, the local birds may visit it only sporadically while they figure out if this is going to be okay and safe. Braver, bully birds may be your main customers early on. Plan for that, and increase the amounts you place in the feeder only when there are enough birds to finish it before it goes bad.

About millet: Although a lot of birds love millet, a ton of it ends up on the ground, which gives it a bad reputation among bird lovers. If you watch the birds feeding, you'll find there's usually a good explanation. In my experience the main reason millet ends up all over the ground is because they're part of a mix and jays are sweeping through the tray with their beaks to get to the sunflower seeds. Juncos and other birds that like feeding from the ground can do an all right job of picking up these sweepings off the ground, but the jays can be so messy that they simply can't keep up. My solution? I rarely buy mixed seed. In my experience, if you feed mixed seed then the birds will always keep dumping stuff to get to the stuff they see just out of reach through the feeding port. My chickens are the same way. I feed them a uniform layer pellet in their feeder, and mixed seed (the scratch) is distributed only on clean ground or in small enough amounts in a heavy pan that it'll be all gone in a few minutes. To attract different birds, I put thistle in one feeder, sunflower in another, and peanuts in the shell in a feeder that's a bit tough to get them out of to keep my jays busy and entertained. Seed is relatively cheap, but why waste money by feeding stuff that mostly ends up on the ground?

Speaking of stuff on the ground: it will happen. There are parts of the seed, usually hulls but also bits of seed that escape the birds when they sit and crack them before swallowing, that will end up all over under the feeder. Birds also poop while they eat. Even the mixes that have been shelled will not have pristine ground underneath. If you're fastidious, you don't want a deck feeder, nor do you want a feeder stuck to a window with a suction cup with your favorite lawn chair sitting underneath. I recommend siting your feeder in a sweet spot where you can both see the feeder, but where the debris will serve a valuable service: namely, fertilizer and mulch. I have feeders on and among a grove of deciduous trees beside my house. The trees were struggling along until we came along and pruned off dead and crossing branches, and set up a feeding area under them. To us, those small birds don't seem to produce significant amounts of fertilizer, but that little bit made a huge difference to our trees. The hulls and broken bits of seed provide valuable mulch, contain organics that help loosen and condition soil, and the whole mix of debris attracts earthworms and other organisms that enrich the soil. Alas, it's not worth it to plant pretty flowers around the base of a feeder unless it's a big enough one that they're somewhat protected from all the falling stuff. But, if you have a moveable feeder, you might consider changing the placement by a few feet each year and plant annuals where the feeder was before. Turn what a lot of people consider a disadvantage into an advantage!

A special note about hummingbirds: sugar water can spoil rapidly in warm weather, which will harm the little jeweled jerks. My answer is to feed in fall and spring, when flowers are scarce, and wean them off when the garden begins to flourish through the summer. I have a lot of plants that are great for keeping our hummingbirds well-supplied with nectar, and natural nectar is better for them anyway. Yes, it's nice to have them humming around your window where you can enjoy them, but you can also plant something like a honeysuckle, train it over an arch set over a bench, and voila! Perfect place to read in summer. Not as convenient, yes, but these days we need all the excuses we can get to go outside.

Another note about hummingbirds: they are fast but unfortunately cats can catch hummingbirds. When planting for hummingbirds or when feeding them, consider height. You can't control all the predation that goes on. Cats will get the adorable little hummingbirds and it's sad, but not technically your fault. To keep yourself as guilt-free as possible, place hummingbird feeders very high and prune up plants that produce attractive flowers, or put plants meant for hummingbirds in hanging baskets or in tall containers. The death zone for hummers can be quite high for a skilled cat that has decided that hummingbirds are favorite prey, but it seems to me the worst area for them is at ground level up to about three feet. At that height range even a cat that's not that into birds may be tempted to give it a go. To be safe, try to get feeders and plants up above five feet whenever possible. Lastly, although male hummingbirds will sometimes make attractive nests quite high up, often the females, after choosing that male to be their beloved, will nest much lower and that's where they'll raise their chicks. In fact, many birds nest much lower than you'd expect. So be careful when you're gardening!

There are lots and lots of reasons why you want to do your main pruning, plant moving, etc. in late winter or mid-to-late fall, but one of them is that you may inadvertently destroy a nest full of chicks, or expose them to the weather and predators. Also, beware of disposing of debris piles that have sat around a long time. A random summer day may not be the best time to light that baby up. Quite a few birds like nesting in what they see as a nice, undisturbed debris pile where large predators will have a hard time finding them, if they even bother to look in such a place. The birds don't know it's slated for burning at your next convenience. Thank you for checking or simply waiting until after the nesting season before you dispose of that loose pile of branches from the wind storm a while back. Conversely, if you want to create an odd but often attractive nesting site for birds that like to nest close to ground level, you can build a debris pile for them, and make it quite attractive with complementary plantings and found art. They may or may not use it, and eventually decay will make it flat, but a debris pile can be attractive for quite some time and if you do get some nesting birds there, it's super fun to watch them dash back and forth while they're raising their babies.

Thank you for reading!

Sometimes, Fun Things are a Chore

Another animal day.

First off, woke up and looked for Carey on the deck, like I do every morning.  No Carey.  It's really hard to keep my hopes up when I hear the coyotes cry all night.

Then, deer, not once but twice.  They savaged my super-expensive ($2.45 for only 25 seeds!) broccoli, but I didn't see that.  What I did see was a doe with her spotted fawn helping themselves to our apples.  Which was fine, and actually really cute.  We have more apples than we know what to do with this year.  There's really only so much applesauce, apple pie, apple tart, apple juice, baked, fresh, and caramel and/or candied apples a person can eat, you know.  They did a nice job of picking the fallen ones first, before moving on to the ones hanging from the tree branches.  How nice.  Every time a car or truck went by, the doe would look annoyed and the fawn bounced around or dashed like mad for cover.  They left, and then returned for more after about an hour.

Last but not least, the suicidal baby robin.  I tried to save it.  Really I did.  The girl and I chased it around until I caught it and put it up in our big trees.  It should have been able to hop and half-ass fly from branch to branch all the way back up to the nest.

But, of course, when I went back out to change the sprinkler, there it was.  The Poop was stalking it.  She ran for it at the same time I did.  She dropped it because I yelled at her at the same time that one of the parent robins dive-bombed her.  The Poop jetted for the edge of the tree's dripline while I dutifully put the stupid, spotted thing with not enough flight feathers or tail to fly back into the tree.  All the cats were then banished to the house.

If it's still alive when we get home, and on the ground again, we might have a guest for a week or two while it finishes fledging out.

Wildlife.  Ugh.  Didn't I used to marvel at it when I was a child?  Actually, I still do, and it's neat that we get to experience this up close most of the time.  Sometimes, though, it makes me a little crazy.

Silver Jewels

We had a nice silver thaw (aka a silver frost) last night. I love the way the ice turns every blade of grass, every limb, every fallen leaf into a jewel. Although the skies have turned platinum and slate now, for much of the morning our land basked in sunshine pouring through a huge blue well above our house.

As the day wore on, these ice wrappings around the limbs began to melt and fall off the limbs. Icicles dangling from the eaves shrank and some shattered on the frozen deck. Juncos, sparrows, towhees, jays, chickadees and finches, swarming the bird feeders, dodge the falling ice as they feed beneath the trees. A couple of times now a red-shafted flicker has landed on the window frame, his tail propped on the glass, and peered inside the house with guarded suspicion while pecking away at whatever is interesting him in the siding. (We have a few mushrooms growing there, and/or there might be some bugs trying to overwinter in the cracks.) Normally I'd say ack, btw, but he's not drilling. Whatever he's eating, he's picking out very delicately.

Anyway.

Incredible morning, lovely afternoon, and as the afternoon wears into evening, an expectation of everything that melted turning into a solid sheet of ice. Again.

I like to include this kind of stuff in my writing, but I bear one thing in mind. As lovely as this is to look at through my window, it would be pretty miserable to deal with if you had to be out in the weather. I think it's too easy for many writers, in their climate-controlled (or at least not out in the open weather) to forget that being snuggled up inside a cloak on horseback in winter weather wouldn't be anywhere nearly as comfortable as sitting in a cushy chair in their house in a house coat, even if their office was a little chilly.

I remember, in particular, freezing my buns off within three feet of a substantial fire inside a stone building. Freezing. Could see my breath cold. That fire had no hope of overwhelming the very high rafters and the draftiness of the place, never mind warm up the ice-cold stones of the floor and walls that sapped the heat from the very air and any body part unlucky enough to be in even indirect contact with them. About all I managed to get warm was my hands and face.

So I'm happy to enjoy this lovely weather from within my nice, warm house and on brief, fun-seeking stints outdoors followed immediately by hot apple cider or hot chocolate with extra mini-marshmallows. My characters in this sort of weather ... not so happy. I'd even hazard they'll be downright miserable, though the more poetic of them might have to admit that it is beautiful.

Stay warm out there!

I Can't Shake Him!

The whistling, buzzing sound zipped by me like a vengeful alien mutant giant wasp favored by the Old Ones.  

Yay, a hummingbird!  Rufous, to be exact.  First of the season.  (Some hummingbirds stick around all year but generally they do that in the valley--not here in the hills.)  I go inside and fix up the first batch of hummingbird food of the year, one part cane sugar, four parts water, absolutely and never anything else like honey (kills them) or fruit juice (spoils rapidly) or food coloring (totally unnecessary.)  This year I have organic cane sugar, which came out looking like flat, weak beer but the hummingbird didn't mind.  He buzzed me as I put it up, and then came in to feed.  

Only to be chased by another hummingbird.  

Good grief.  The feeder is up all of five minutes and we already have hummingbird wars?  Really?

These two have been dogfighting ever since I put the thing up.  Once toward evening yesterday they both settled to feed at the same time--I think they were low on energy to begin with and tired each other out.  Not today.  Today they are high on sugar and it's non-stop hummingbird action.  One has found a favored perch within a few feet of the feeder, on my white akebia vine, which is about ready to explode with blossoms.

If I'm going to attract any Anna's hummingbirds this year I'll have to hide a second feeder and possibly a third.  Between the late spring tube flowers that will provide natural fodder and multiple feeders, some of the more shy hummingbirds may be able to stake out a small claim if they don't give up with disgust before the plant leaf-out provides them with some cover.  But I suspect it'll be rufous hummers and not much else around here.

Morning sweetness

The little fluffy personalities are back.  I heard them first thing this morning when I woke up.  My bedroom window is open except in the hottest and coldest weather so I can usually hear who's up and about, whether it's coyotes, the hummingbirds engaging in their constant wars, the sparrows, the towhees, the goats picking through the flattened blackberry patch (yay goats!) one of our hawks, geese with their strangely mournful cries flying overhead, the soothing voices of content cattle, horses galloping like fools around the pasture, dogs barking at evil bicyclists or people walking up the road or horses going by or sanitation employees stealing our garbage or the mailman or the bunny nibbling in the veggie patch, or rain (and the scent that comes with it) or rushing wind making music with the leaves of thousands of trees, or the simple quiet of first morning light as I wake from a dream.

Buzy Daze

After running around for what seems like forever we're all ready for some down time around here.  But for other local families life is gearing up.  The baby swallows are out and about today.  They can fly quite well and one of them was even hunting earlier, but they'd rather sit on our clothesline and get fed.  I was able to get quite close, but not as close as I'd like outside and not at a good angle, so sorry about the cruddy quality of the pics.

There are at least five little birds.  The fifth one is sitting apart from the others and it seems more interested than the others in hunting for itself, at least sometimes.

They're adorable and I'm glad they graced us today.

I'm sitting, dazed, thinking about what a big day I've had.  That's about as far as my brain wants to travel.  Like a tired dog it'll follow along just behind me if I walk, but then it sits down as soon as I stop.  

Nothing bad happened.  Nothing extraordinary.  I mowed, the kids and I took the dogs for a walk, spent some time with my DH before he left for work, did a little shopping, rented movies and watched one (Stand and Deliver) and managed email.  I sent some pics of the cedar waxwings to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology--they'd had cedar waxwings on their minds and might include them in informational stuff about providing food for birds.  Maybe one of my pics will end up on a poster or on their website.  That would be fun.

On the writing front, I'll be getting feedback for Sin tomorrow.  This flash has me stumped, but that's no surprise.  I haven't mastered short fiction, or even gotten out of the Kindergarten for Short Fiction Writers.  I expect after INK and Lucky Labs are done with it, I'll have a much better idea of how to approach Sin.  

It made me smile to write that.

Cedar Waxwings

I didn't know that cedar waxwings drank nectar.  The hummingbirds were not amused.

By the way, the plant is called a red hot poker plant (also known as a torch lily and by other names.)  I got the start for this one from my friend Jane.  The leaves on these amazing plants can look somewhat shabby, especially at winter, but they're worth having around for their spectacular displays and their magical bird-attracting powers.  They also are a favorite of bees and some butterflies.  

If you want a red hot poker plant give it plenty of room.  They spread slowly and steadily and are difficult to dig out.  If you want to contain one to a certain area, put it in a big plastic container (like the kind nurseries keep large trees in) and bury the container.  

By the way, slugs love red hot poker plants.  Start baiting for slugs in early spring by sprinkling some English formula slug bait deep under the leaves in a couple of places.  Don't worry about getting the middle--in fact, if you get some slug bait on the stalk buds in the center of the plant you run the risk of poisoning the birds should rain fail to rinse it all off.  Just lift up the draped leaves on the sides and shake the slug bait underneath.  Doing it this way will hopefully limit how many animals get into it.  If you have a lot of wildlife or household pets you need to protect, use wildlife-safe pellets or just put the regular slug bait under a rock or heavy pot.  The slugs will contort themselves to get to the bait.  If you don't bait for slugs you may get a lot of deformed flowers, if you get any at all, during those bad slug years.

It's easy to get starts for the red hot poker, or you can grow them from seed.  Divide the red hot poker in the spring (although you can get away with it almost any time of the year) or get seeds through a catalogue or from a neighbor.  If you want blossoms through the fall you have to deadhead the spent stalks.

I think I'll go sit in my garden some more.  It's been a beautiful day.

Yet another reason why I like Blogger, and birds

I tried a new feature on Blogger and I love it.  I'm pretty lazy, so given a chance to streamline things, including playtime, I take advantage of opportunity (provided it's easy.)  Hence auto deductions for most of our regular bills and writing first thing in the morning.

If you check out the sidebar you'll see the new blog list in action.  I especially like the blurbs feature.  I have some blogs on RSS that I check via email, but I like this Blogger feature better.  

Today I almost caught sight of the (assumed) lazuli bunting through the binocs several times.  This bird is beyond paranoid.  It's definitely a wham bam thank you ma'am type of birdfeeder visitor.  It zooms in, pecks, and leaves.  I despair of ever getting a pic of it, but maybe, eventually, I'll catch it sitting on a perch singing (apparently they do this periodically) and then I'll add it to the online collection.  

The mourning doves haunt the house constantly now.  I can't walk through my garden without flushing them.  They're ground feeders, and when they're disturbed they lay low and still in the hopes you won't notice them.  I imagine I've walked by plenty of times without flushing them and never known it, but several times a day I'll be minding my own business about the garden when the wild fluttering and rusty sounds erupt from the tall grass.  Once I've scared them off they perch nearby, watching me, and make mournful noises.  They may be trying to sound intimidating or at least aggravated, but instead they sound (as their name implies) like they're drowning in grief.  

Meanwhile our three hummingbirds have stepped up the warfare ever since some of their favorite flowers have begun blooming.  In a sane world, more resources available to a stable population=less conflict, but we're talking hummingbirds (and a not-very-sane world overall) here.  We've now become prime, highly desirable territory which means they're even more determined to harass each other and compete for everything.  They literally have a full acre of garden to divide, but they insist on perching within a few feet of each other and try to feed from the same plants or feeder at the same time instead of sneaking off and feeding while the others are distracted by the feeder or another region of the garden.  I guess this keeps their population fit.  I know I'd be a lot sleeker if I had to fight for my dinner.  

Hmm.  Maybe I shouldn't have mentioned that.  It might give my DH ideas.

The Visitors

Yesterday I had a rare (to me) visitor, a bird I've only heard of but I've never seen in person.  The fun thing is that it could actually be one of two birds.

I thought it was a bluebird, but after scoping out the bird books I realized the bird had too bright a belly and probably wasn't hefty enough to be a bluebird.  Not to say it isn't, but it seems more likely that it's a lazuli bunting!  

We also had a chipmunk visiting.  I've seen absolutely no squirrels or squirrel-like creatures on our land.  I've seen them as close as the neighbor's place--small squirrels with long, tufted ears--but no chipmunks.  Wizard caught him and brought him home.  I scooted Wizard inside after he dropped the chipmunk at my feet and the chipmunk ran off.  He came back later to forage under the bird feeder.  I don't know how many times the cats will bring him home, but hopefully they'll release him unharmed each time.  He's a cutie, even though I suspect that it's him that ate my lilies.

I have to go back to work tomorrow.  Just in time.  I spent the (sunny! yay!) day out sicklebar mowing paths through the sea of grass and making a new tomato bed.  I have more to do out there, now that I have mulch in the back of the pickup.  Boy, am I pooped!  I'll need the recovery time before I get back to slaving in the garden.  Yes, it's begun, the long days of getting up at dawn and working until dusk, but I am writing.  I worked on a novel and a new short story this morning.  

I love summer.

It's a funny kind of mom's day.  Mourning Nikita's loss, mimosas, chocolate covered donut holes, a beautiful letter from my daughter, transplanting plant acquisitions from the Mother's Day sale in downtown Camas, reading critiques of my opening for Masks on Flogging the Quill, going on a mad photographical spree when the sun peeked out for about ten minutes.  It's a good day, but in constant flux.  The washing machine of my life is in the agitation cycle.  The pics, in order, starting with the upper left, akebia vine growing through our deck upstairs, honeybush bought at the Mom's Day market, black-headed grosbeak (safety first grosbeak) and mourning dove.

Also today, got a nice rejection from an agent.  Haven't found a mean one yet.  Denied!  It's encouraging, though, since they're all so encouraging.  

A couple of notes

Sorry about the pic quality.  Taking photos through our hazy side windows is chancy at best.  

As you can see, the goldfinches have arrived in force, much to the disappointment of the lone pair that had been sharing the feeders only with pine siskins until now.  With the arrival of the mourning doves, I think this is easily the most diversity of birds we've had at the property since we've moved here.  

Katherine is back from the vet.  She's recovering, doing all the things she's not supposed to do like jumping, but in moderation.  We have her holed up in the master bedroom until she's healed up a bit more before we reintroduce her to Wizard's playfulness and Huntress' bitter hatred, seeing as this could lead to forbidden activities like running.  Also, we don't want her to be tempted to hop (or attempt to hop) onto the kitchen counter for food.  She has a food bowl and water on the floor just for her, a non-top-entry catbox (love those things!) and the scratchpost sleeper that's not tall enough for her to stretch on (and also makes a handy step up to the bed so she doesn't have to jump on the bed.) 

At least the camera is working

Rory gave me a clue, so now my camera is operational again.  Yay!  Just in time for serious gardening season.  It's late, but not too late, to weed like crazy in hopes to limit weed seed generation and spread.  We're high enough on the hill that the dandelions haven't turned into puffballs yet, but I noticed that lower down there's lots of yellow and white in the meadows and along the roads.  Other weeds are just getting wound up so if you have a garden, or even just a few containers, get out there and get to work.  Locally the soil is the perfect texture--not too hard and dry, not so wet that everything clumps into yucky globs.

It's too early for tomatoes, peppers, beans and other warm crops to go into the ground, though they can go into containers.  The air is the right temp but the soil isn't, yet.  But just about anything that isn't a tropical or sub-tropical dainty can get planted.  I spent the whole day on hands and knees filling the white garden beds with sweet alyssum, pansies, wave petunias and snapdragons.  When they all fill in it should look really sharp.

I've identified the mystery hummers.  There are two female rufous hummingbirds as well as the lone male we've seen so far.  They're fearless--too fearless, as I saw one humming around my hanging flower baskets sedately dodging Huntress as she leapt repeatedly for the bird.  I chased Huntress off before she got it, but the kids reported that Wizard got one a couple of weeks ago.  So we had four, and are down to three unless the captured one managed to get away.  Their numbers will probably grow as we warm up.  We're keeping the cats in most of the time, which will help, I hope.

While I was adding bird seed to one of the feeders I noticed there was a pine siskin that didn't want to fly off.  It just hopped around.  It looks like a male to me, and too bright to be an immature one.  Maybe it's sick?  The pine siskins let me get very, very close and often watch me from a couple of feet away in the tree when I fill their feeders, but I've never seen one hop around on the ground like this before.  If he's sick he's not going to make it, not with all the predators around, even if we keep the cats in continuously for the next several days.  He's so cute, it makes me sad.  But maybe he's fine.  He stayed in the area long enough for me to get my camera, come back, and take pics of him, and then I decided to stay away from him so he didn't get stressed.  Unfortunately that means I don't know if he eventually flew off, so I'll be thinking about him worried that he's suffering.  I don't know if the dirty bill means anything.  I think it's just cracked nyjer seeds.  There may be an illness going around, because I've heard others mention finding more dead birds than usual, especially pine siskins.  I've also found a towhee with no apparent cause of death visible on it, and the dogs have ended up with an unusual number of dead birds in their clutches this year.

I'm all stressed, depressed (not real bad, just gloomy) and hormonal right now.  Chocolate is helping.  Maybe I'll have some red wine tonight too.  Last glass for a while, because I'll probably need ibuprofen in the morning and I never mix alcohol and ibuprofen.  It's too hard on the liver.

Birds, Plants, Catching Up and Poop

Today I began the process of catching up.  Hopefully I'll complete that process by the end of this weekend.

Why, Kami, what in the world would you have to catch up on?

Glad you asked.

(Dangit!  I know better than that!)  Please, go on.

Writing/Marketing

Laundry

Tiling

Gardening stuff

Vacuuming/dusting

Barn modifications (always a hoot)

Paperwork/filing

Notice, dishes are not on the list.  I'm all caught up.  Yay!

I had to put up two more bird feeders to handle the overflow, and I'm glad I did because we had a beautiful visitor today.  We've seen him before (last year, and for some reason I didn't mention him in this blog,) just one visit but it was memorable.  I hope he sticks around this time and maybe brings his black-headed grosbeak friends.  Why they call them black-headed grosbeaks is beyond me, btw.  I mean c'mon, what's the first color that strikes you when you see this bird?  Is it his black head?  I think not.  How about flaming orange grosbeak?  Or maybe safety first grosbeak.  

If you read the cool facts portion of the link, you'll see that the female of this species is particularly sneaky.  I prefer a relationship based on honesty, but hey, if the guy grosbeak won't sit on the eggs, I guess a girl grobeak's gotta do what a girl grosbeak's gotta do.  

In the sad news category, my poopyhead camera which had healed itself has unhealed and once again won't focus on anything except when I resign myself to point and shoot.  This means no flower closeups and no bird zooms until either A. I can teach myself how to focus the camera by eye (not easy with the digital interface) B. the camera heals itself again C. I can figure out why the camera focus mechanism keeps going out and fix it myself D. get the camera repaired ($ouchie$) E. replace the camera ($$$ouchie$$$) or F. some extremely clever option that will come to me any day in which no time, money or cursing will be expended in the operation of this camera ever again.  I'm particularly annoyed that it decided to stop working because I've had so many great opportunities to snap some stunning pics of our many birdie visitors and the hundreds of flowers that are in bloom in the garden.  Poop, I say, poop.

Bird days

For those of us (fools) who put out bird feeders and keep them stocked with a variety of goodies, this year has been crazy with the birds.  I don't know if it's the weather or what, but come 7:30am or thereabouts, I have an amazing number and variety of birds.  Yesterday and today I had at my feeder:

A red-shafted flicker (he likes the suet!)

Two crows (the local ones are normally too shy to come this close--as they learn that will change and they might even learn to eat out of our hands)

The starling (sigh)

A brown-headed cowbird

A pair of goldfinches (first of the year!) in breeding colors

At least a dozen evening grosbeaks

More pine siskins than you can shake a stick at

At least three pairs of house finches (we started with one lonely pair)

A family of chickadees--there are at least three

The ever-persistent nuthatch

Several golden-crowned sparrows

Several white-crowned sparrows

The juncos (of course)

The family of five Stellar jays

A pair (at least) of scrub jays

All. At. Once.

(I may link more birds to this post later but I think this will do for now.)

It's like a circus out there.  As shy as the flicker is around people, he's not at all shy around other birds.  He's big enough that even the grosbeaks won't mess with him.  He sits on the tree, leans over and pecks at the suet or sometimes lands on the feeder (which tips it precariously) where he sits folded over with his tail braced on the underside and removes large chunks of suet.  The stellar jays fly in, scattering everyone but the grosbeaks, and then they fly to the ground after the grosbeaks don't budge, chasing the juncos, finches and sparrows to the perimeter of the dropped-feed zone where they pick in the grass and mud.  A car goes by, flushing the grosbeaks, and everyone else zooms in to eat before they come back.  Pine siskins and the goldfinches duke it out at the nyjer feeder, while chickadees and the nuthatch duke it out at the suet bar.  The house finches steal meals here and there at the nyjer feeder but the pine siskins, which are surprisingly aggressive considering their small size, dominate.  The crows watch and wait for opportunities wherever they may arise.  They can't fit on the feeder but they move on the ground at a stately pace picking up the big chunks of nuts that are too much for the smaller birds to handle (the grosbeaks ignore the nuts and usually sweep them out of the feeder in favor of sunflower seeds.)

You can hear the noise from all these birds wherever you happened to be upstairs.  Down here in my office, their voices don't quite reach.

And at my kitchen window:

A rufous hummingbird and two female (or juvenile?) hummers of undetermined species

I know it's baffling to a lot of people.  Why on earth would I feed the birds?

I guess it's like having an aquarium (which I also enjoy but don't currently have one set up) except that at a bird feeder, you never know who's going to show up.  I like it better than tv.  And it keeps my cats entertained.  They watch hummingbird tv while they eat on the kitchen counter.  So do most people who enjoy bird feeding also enjoy aquariums?  Is it a brain/personality thing?  Do those people also typically find gardening rewarding?  Are they fascinated by terrariums as children?  I sure was.  

Sorry, gotta go.  I want to see who else is going to show up at the feeder this morning.

The Starling

Yes, it's a starling.  But as much as I don't care for them, being a non-native nuisance bird that causes problems for native birds, this bird and starlings from around the world are among the most beautiful birds in the world.  I think part of the reason that I'm immune to a starling's good looks is because I was taught from an early age that they're a dirty, nasty pest.  But who could not love faces like these:

Superb starling

Asian pied starling

Rosy starling

Brahminy starling

Maybe European starlings are dirty, nasty pests, and I don't like the fact that we'll probably never see any bluebirds around here because of them, but you know, I have to admit, they are rather pretty.

Right now we have one that visits daily.  I doubt that will remain the case.  Down the hill from us a barn has a plague of them, where once nested sparrows only a few short years ago.

They're Here!

I finally snagged some pics of the grosbeaks.  Today was probably the most bird-diverse day we've ever had.  The grosbeaks mingled with juncos, varied thrushes, house finches, chickadees, robins, stellar jays, scrub jays and our lone nuthatch.  All at once.  Unfortunately it was raining when they all came so I could only sneak out once during a dry spell when the grosbeaks had chased the juncos out of the feeder.  By looking at our feeder it appears that we have only a slightly heavy sunflower seed mix, but looks are deceiving with this mix from Costco.  It includes quite a few shelled sunflower seeds.  It also has peanut pieces, but I don't know if the grosbeaks like those.  They're really picky about what they want as far as feeder food.  If you don't have enough sunflower seeds, they'll move on.  Our flock today was about ten individuals, mostly male but a few females.  I've seen as many as a dozen and maybe this year we'll see even more.  They tend to return to the same feeders on their migratory paths so there's an opportunity to get more and more each year as the chicks accompany their parents.

Also new today, hyacinths.  I'm sure they've been around for quite some time in the valley, but seeing them in full bloom here for the first time gave me one of those yay moments.  The low-growing tulips are stretching their necks, and all the early daffodils are open now.  The daylilies are tall enough that the fish don't look silly.  Roses are sending out their first leaves.  The tree peonies are opening their first flush of purple leaves and the regular peonies have buds peeking out.  Primroses are going crazy.  Hostas have their noses poking out.  Pansies have got their faces painted on.  The daphnes are getting ready to pop open while the lenten roses have been open for a good month and are wondering what everyone else is waiting for.  The place is starting to look up.  Maybe someday I'll have a garden that looks good year-round, but for now I have to wait until spring for my show and I'm so glad the opening act has started.

We had just enough sunshine that I managed to dash out and get our Christmas tree from this year planted, and I yanked more baby blackberries and put out slug food.  I know every year I lose quite a bit to slugs and most of the time I shrug it off, but this year I was very disappointed to see that slugs had destroyed several of those kewl tulips.  I don't know what's more heartbreaking--seeing a bud eaten down to just a little color showing or having the stem chewed through and the blossom laying in the mud.  The stub, I guess.  At least I can bring the blossom in.  Die slugs die!  I need to encourage more snakes, although this time of year the snakes are still napping most of the time and won't be eating much in slugs.  

The equinox is the day after tomorrow.  I don't know if I'll be doing anything special except welcoming the day.  I have to work, drat-0.  Maybe I'll celebrate by coming home to a clean house.  That means lots of work tomorrow.  Cleaning out the house is a semi-tradition here at the household on the equinox, not exactly a party, but really rewarding.  The mini-cleans I've done over the past weeks will help set the stage for a great spring cleaning, I hope.  Yay clean house, yay birds, yay spring!  Even when it rains, when the flowers are blooming it's a beautiful day.

Bird brained part 2

Varied thrush (Oregon juncos are also in that same frame,) song sparrow, pine siskin and a reappearance by our local red-breasted nuthatch (in the same frame as the pine siskin.)  Not pictured in either post: scrub jay, fox sparrow, robin, evening grosbeak (seasonal,) western gold finch (when we put out thistle, usually just in summer,) rufous hummingbird (seasonal,) Anna's hummingbird (seasonal,) golden-crowned sparrow (rare, for us,) cedar waxwing (seasonal, transient,) european starling (sigh,) barn swallow (seasonal,) violet-green swallow (seasonal,) tree swallow (seasonal,) pileated woodpecker, northern flicker, great horned owl, barn owl, American kestral (if you're local look up on the wire near the big cow barn across from Windy Ridge--there's almost always one sitting there in plain sight.  They come up to our house too but they're so small we rarely see them,) red-tailed hawk, osprey, great blue heron, osprey, and turkey vulture (sometimes we get a whole flight of them soaring just a few feet off the blackberries.)  We've had pheasants, but they're delicious so they're usually eaten by coyotes, owls, hawks, raccoons or other predators before they can reproduce locally.   

Maybe I'll make a project of getting pics of our local birds.  I predict that the most difficult real possibility is going to be the heron, because they never land on our property, just overfly, but never is an awfully strong word and you never know.  Unfortunately I see no possibility of capturing an image of our owls with my current equipment.  I'd need a tripod, a scope and a camera that attaches to it and a very clear, bright, full moon night combined with the owl very kindly settling for a long time on our snag so that I can do a long exposure.

Yeah.  Not gonna happen.

Or maybe someday Rory will have a camera in the car with him the next time a barn owl flies onto the road in front of him and stands there staring, offended that the car would dare shine its nasty light on its loveliness.  Click!

These images are clickable for the semi-full-sized view.  I didn't want to download the humungous files onto the web because it would take forever on dialup.

Bird brained

Cloudy weather kept me in.  Normally I ignore clouds and go garden anyway, but I had some projects to work on inside and the clouds were a handy excuse.  "I'll just wait until they burn off," I told myself.  Well, the sun only managed to burn a few holes here and there.  The clouds remained.  

When we got that smidge of sun I snuck out and parked myself on the ground near the bird feeders in three different spots, trying to catch a pic of a new visitor.  The yellow-faced bird visited very briefly yesterday and promptly vanished before I could get a solid enough look to ID it.  Poopy bird.  It didn't return today but I got pics of most of our usual suspects.

Oregon junco, red-breasted nuthatch, house finch, Steller's jay, spotted towhee, black-capped chickadee.

Many Happy Returns

Nope, this one isn't about the Barbie lady.  Surprise!

I was in the lobby when a gentleman came in with a large box of sporting goods.  I give him the usual cheery greeting (I was particularly cheery that day, too) and dinged the bell.  Before I could ask him if those were returns, he flashed a badge and told me his name.  "I'm with [our town] police department and I'm here to return some stolen merchandise."

I blink, grinning like a fool.  "Really?"

He smiles back at me.  "Yup."

I page our sporting goods super, and then page him again when he doesn't answer right away.  The manager and asst. manager walk by and the Big Guy mentions that the sporting goods super might be tied up with a customer.  "I think this is something you guys may want to get involved in anyway," I tell them.  "The police department is returning some stolen goods."

Handshakes all around and gushing thanks from everyone.  

The sad part of the story--the thief was a former employee of ours.  He not only got caught with the stuff but a local pawn shop reported suspicious transactions so the guy was charged with trafficking in stolen merchandise, a much bigger owie for him (federal) than just taking the stuff and using it for his own purposes.  He pled guilty and handed over everything that he had stashed to help save himself some time.  

The sporting goods super arrived and we got to explain again.  More handshakes, more big

 smiles.  They went through the box item by item.  Deluxe predator call.  Fish finder sonar.  Gun fittings.  All kinds of stuff, all higher priced items, all smaller than a breadbox and in the original packaging.  Anti-climactically, I guess they just get put back on the shelf but what a great boon for the store.  It added up to hundreds of dollars of loss magically (well, not magically, but due to the diligence and hard work of our local police, yay!) reappearing in our inventory.

I had some household happy returns too.  Yesterday our crocuses exploded.  Deer and bunnies had taken quite a few out or trimmed them so that the flowers looked weird, but most of them are in perfect shape and look gorgeous.  The earliest of our daffodils are ready to pop any day now, if the weather holds, which it isn't supposed to but now that we have crocuses I'm happy just to look outside and see some color and sunshine.  I took the pic early in the morning so everything isn't all golden and the flowers are still closed up.  Notice that the pansies are starting to bloom now too.  The ones at the store are loaded with blooms but having the ones from last year come back and start blooming without the benefits of a greenhouse--that's especially wonderful.  It's even more remarkable when I consider that the slugs normally eat them down to little irretrievable nubbins.  I lost most of the ones in the jester garden and those that lived have no buds, but these three plants in my pagan cheese crock were spared. 

We also had a return of the robin who thinks he's a duck.  He did some proper bird bathing too, but mostly he sat with his belly immersed in the water, soaking.  Goofy bird, but so cute! 

I  tried to get a pic after letting him have some peace and quiet for ten minutes, but when I went outside he flew awkwardly away, dripping.  Welcome back, duck robin!  I imagine this is something that robins do in general, but I'd like to think it's the same one.  This robin duck pic is from March 22, 2006.  

My last return salute is to the sun.  As is often the case in February, we had a couple of weeks worth of sun and warm weather (not consecutive but pretty darned close.)  There's a good chance we'll get a hard frost and lose a lot of fruit buds, but so far so good and I'd rather risk that than not have the sun.  It feels so good to put on a tank top, slather on sunscreen (with that yummy sunscreen smell) and work hard in the garden.  I'll miss it when the rains come.  Sometimes the rain stays with us all the way through June.  Can't begrudge that, though.  Without the rain we wouldn't be green, and the mountains wouldn't be white, and in summer the river would get too low and all would be badness.  So come on in, rain, but if you can spare me a few more days of sun, I won't complain.