Soma
Sacred Earth => Animals, Birds, and all our other creature friends [Public] => Topic started by: nichi on March 23, 2007, 08:51:59 AM
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I've been one to feed the critters over the past 30+ years, but I've had to slow down in that venture here in the last year, due to the attraction of rats. They are dead and gone now, but you get gunshy when one of the creepy guys walks over your shoe, as if you aren't there. If I never see another one, I will be happy.
Still, though, who can resist the calls and screams of the blue jays outside your window, as they seem to "know" you're up and about? So I have been putting out peanuts. Plus, the squirrels also enjoy them. The good thing about peanuts is that the birds get them "to go" -- it would strange indeed if at the end of the day, there were peanuts left over.
But there is something else more interesting and attractive to the birds than peanuts and sunflower seeds::: water! I've got 6 bird-bath fix-ups in the back yard. I filled them all up moments ago, and while I waited for my coffee to come down, I got a variety of birds coming in for a drink or a splash (nothing too unusual, but showing how quickly they catch on):
Robin, for whom birdbaths are more than a drink: they are ecstasy!
(http://www.statesymbolsusa.org/IMAGES/Connecticut/american_robin5.jpg)
Cardinal, state bird of Virginia:
(http://www.statesymbolsusa.org/IMAGES/Virginia/cardinal_byOwnby1.jpg)
Blue Jay, who also gets ecstatic in the baths:
(http://eliot.needham.k12.ma.us/technology/lessons/animals/images/jay2.jpg)
Eastern Towhee, who loves the mud around the baths:
(http://www.learnbirdsongs.com/images/eastern-towheewtmk.jpg)
Brown Thrasher, musical cousin to the mockingbird:
(http://www.msu.edu/~gravingr/thrasher.jpg)
and a host of mourning doves, starlings and grackles.
All within a few minutes.
Water is premium stuff!
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At sunrise, crows come, before the crowd arrives...
Funny to watch them, as they are as large as the baths themselves.
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Thanx for the reminder, Sis. I need to get mine out real soon.
The field across from the house was literally FULL of robin pairs this a.m. :)
The jays and blacks have already returned so I need to get my wren houses out, don't cha think?
t
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Yeah, this is the time! :)
I've had houses before, but they were "blocked" always before the wrens could set up shop. Some bird (starling, I suspect) staking his claim with a stick in the entrance, so no one can get in!
Wrens are great -- love to listen to their orneriness!!
Who'd a thunk such a little bird could kick up such a fuss? :D
Around here, the carolina wrens:
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The field across from the house was literally FULL of robin pairs this a.m. :)
t
I love it when the robins come back!
Missed them in California last year -- imagine a place in n.america without robins! :o
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Apropos birds and baths. I look forward to follow the rituals at our pond in the garden. Its blackbird, blue jays and more that have their regular procedures at the shore of the pond.
For the pond there is also a new cohort of goldfish ready to be installed. We got this mini aquarium with seven fishes that shall be the new inhabitors.
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So hard to not be giddy as I tell you that I was watching the baths, and down flew, one, two, four, six, eight, ten or eleven cedar waxwings to one of the baths!! They don't live here -- they only pass through -- and it's always tempting to conclude that ya must have done something right, somewhere along the line, to rate the visit! Some tiny thing! :) :)
They are some of the happiest birds!
(http://www.mikids.com/LCbirds/Cedar%20waxwing.jpg)
They're like travelling marauders --
(http://rip.physics.unk.edu/NOU/Photographs/Waxwings.jpg)
(http://www.birdersworld.com/objects/images/brdpw041010.jpg)
So, giggle I will, for it only lasts a minute!
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They don't live here either, but pass by in the autumn.
(http://ll73.zorpia.com/lrg/0/2967/18993173.3da979.jpg)
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Hey, I want onna them feathers, Yo ! Ha. t
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They don't live here either, but pass by in the autumn.
(http://ll73.zorpia.com/lrg/0/2967/18993173.3da979.jpg)
You must have done something really wonderful, Jahn!
;)
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Hey, I want onna them feathers, Yo ! Ha. t
If I had known that ... the letter to you is already on its way. :P
But in the next letter perhaps?
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No problem, buddy. I'm always looking for the naturally-colorful feathers.
Was just thinking about you and Jenn. Made a new and very powerful Eye of the Future and now it's missing. Hmmmmm. t
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There's a leak in the outdoor water faucet/hose in back, and I left the hose, which slightly drips, in one of the baths. The drip is symptomatic of so much around here, but ignoring that for a minute...
The bath was overflowing and dripping, per the hose being placed in it, and it created waterfalls for the robins! The robins have been dancing back and forth ecstatically in the falls, ignoring the grackles eye-ing them and everything! There are a handful of robins, watching and waiting their turn under the falls.
In between the showers, they dig in the mud being created, a little deeper each time. It's tempting to just let them dig out a pond!
Mud -- worms -- magic falls -- it's Robin Disneyworld!
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We've been in drought conditions for the last several months, but in the last week, we've had a couple of strong rains. Plus, yesterday the temperature hit 70 degrees F.
So today, even with the temperature back down to the 40's, spring birds are still picking about around the water holes. Especially the ground-feeding birds: there must be some serious worming to be had.
In my back yard today, I joyously report
(Pics all snagged from the net.):
American Robin
(http://www.netstate.com/states/symb/birds/images/multi_american_robin.jpg)
Eastern Towhee
(http://www.surfbirds.com/media/gallery_photos/20060319091340.JPG)
Blue Jay
(http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/staticfiles/NGS/Shared/StaticFiles/animals/images/primary/blue-jay.jpg)
Downy Woodpecker
(http://sdakotabirds.com/species/photos/downy_woodpecker.jpg)
Red-bellied Woodpecker
(http://photos.somd.com/data/638/medium/20070325_IMG_0057.JPG)
Northern Flicker
(http://wdfw.wa.gov/gallery2/main.php?g2_view=core.DownloadItem&g2_itemId=10012&g2_serialNumber=3)
Brown Thrasher
(http://cache.eb.com/eb/image?id=41941&rendTypeId=4)
Northern Cardinal
(http://www.roysephotos.com/zzNorthernCardinal16D.jpg)
Twas a fine showing indeed, and it made my week!
Thank-you, spirit!
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Yay!
Spring Birdies!
Right now I have a ton of fat little chickadees and also a little beautifully shiny black bird, with a sapsucker like beak. I do not recognise him. Don't think we have them back in BC. But they are the chatteriest little birds. Sheesh!
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Hunh... I wonder what your sapsucker-y birds are...
I love to hear all the chattering, though.
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Hey, I want onna them feathers, Yo ! Ha. t
They should have arrived now T2f, together with some new ones.
??
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Twas a fine showing indeed, and it made my week!
Thank-you, spirit!
Yes!
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I don't know who enjoys taking a dip in the birdbaths more: robins or blue jays. Both of them linger a long time, and whip themselves into these ecstatic frenzies of bathing, shaking, and shimmey-ing. Water splashing high out of the baths. Again and again and again. I don't know if one could look in the Audubon's Birds of North America Encyclopedia (one of my treasured, few possessions) and even find an article on bird ecstasy, much less on how to spot it. It's something you just know when you see it.
I just watched a pair of blue jays fly from bath to bath to bath, sampling all of them with great zeal, following each other, and looking positively silly with their water-logged crests, bending downward from the cherry-tree branch to take a look into the back porch, where the kitchen window is. (I think they sensed someone watching.) Occasionally their exclamations can be heard ... "Heya! Heya!" Exuberance, plain and simple!
Meanwhile, there is a family of squirrels (Mom and 3 youngsters) chasing each other, and rolling and tumbling together, doing somersaults, making astounding leaps up onto the oak tree from the ground --- having a ball!
A thrasher is doing excavation around one of the baths, throwing leaves high up into the air behind him, as a towhee watches him from one of the branches ... as a mockingbird watches the towhee watching...
Spring is very nearly here and spirits are high!
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And then .. as if to punctuate the post above, my roommate comes back here and says, "There's some kind of bird convention in the back." I return to the kitchen window, to see something I've never seen in this area before (though surely it has existed ... I just haven't had the pleasure.)
A flock of red-winged blackbirds! Usually, they mix in with the torrential flocks of grackles, cowbirds, and starlings -- I've never seen such a gathering of just red-wings. Spring is definitely here! Their call is the signature of spring here in wetland Mid-Atlantia. Red-Winged Blackbird Call (http://www.learnbirdsongs.com/birdsong.php?id=25)
(http://www.marietta.edu/~biol/biomes/images/wetlands/red-winged_blackbird_5317.jpg)
Here's one puffing up as he sings his song:
(http://www.learnbirdsongs.com/images/red-winged-blackbirdwtmk.jpg)
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Red-Winged Blackbird Call (http://www.learnbirdsongs.com/birdsong.php?id=25)
I went to this site and opened five different windows, each with a different bird. I have a whole forest full of birds singing in my office... ;D
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:-* Yeah, that's a great site! I began to make a post with the sounds-of-the-backyard, but they didn't feature all of them... Still, they had quite a few! That's fun that you had 5 windows going!
Blue Jay (http://www.learnbirdsongs.com/birdsong.php?id=5)
(Towards the end of the various calls, you hear BJ's imitation of hawk, which he uses when he wants the other birds to clear the feeding area. Tricky guy, he!)
Chickadee (http://www.learnbirdsongs.com/birdsong.php?id=12)
You can't be unhappy when there are chickadees around: it's not allowed.
Northern Cardinal (http://www.learnbirdsongs.com/birdsong.php?id=3)
American Robin (http://www.learnbirdsongs.com/birdsong.php?id=1)
Haunting at 3am...
Mourning Dove (http://www.learnbirdsongs.com/birdsong.php?id=7)
Northern Mockingbird (http://www.learnbirdsongs.com/birdsong.php?id=4)
If you have one, you will be graced with birdsong, that much is certain, for these guys love to sing. They are up with the robins at 3am...
Red-Winged Blackbird (http://www.learnbirdsongs.com/birdsong.php?id=25)
Eastern Towhee (http://www.learnbirdsongs.com/birdsong.php?id=9)
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Far out! Thank you, Vickie. Makes the winter seem shorter or something. :) :)
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:D Yes, T2!