White-throated Sparrow
White-throated sparrow
Lots of sparrows visit my feeders right outside the windows, and while I’ve heard white-throated sparrows I’ve not seen one, at least not up close. I know they are ground feeders, and in winter I will often hear their little “tseeet tseeet” at dusk and see them deep in one of the dense bushes. But those stripes on his head, the yellow markings and especially that white spot really stood out—this one was right up in my lilac, not coming to the feeder just above it, but scouting the ground underneath before diving down for a prize seed.
White-throated sparrow
Couple of Finches
Couple of Finches
Looks like they’re an item! Both are nearly finished molting from their winter coats to their summer coats, the male bright yellow, the female more of a dull olive, all the better to blend in with the scenery when it’s egg-sitting time. They don’t actually nest until later in the summer, when the thistles are blooming, but that doesn’t mean they can’t stock up at the thistle feeder.
I couldn’t get my telephoto lens on my camera fast enough, so this was taken with the regular portrait lens, it’s a little grainy.
Great Blue Heron: 2011
Great Blue Heron
I found her in her favorite morning fishing spot, though she grew angry and flew farther downstream before I had my camera ready. I readied my lens and crept to the top of the bank as off she flew!
This isn’t in a park or conservation area, this is right in the middle of Carnegie. I dropped my car off for service and walked back home, dipping down by the creek, studying a few industrial areas, walking down a few alleys instead of main streets and then walking on Main Street itself.
Chartiers Creek winds through the middle of town and beyond in both directions, and a colony of great blue herons nests about 11 miles away, considering the entirety of the creek’s channel as their hunting ground. For the most part the creek is less than a foot deep, and today the air turned slightly warmer again, warming the water and bringing out the small creek fish, carp and darters. The heron stands on the gravel on a shallow edge of the creek and as the fish swim between her legs she just reaches down with that long neck and picks them out of the water with her beak like tweezers.
When the heron is standing still in the water, she is so slender that she looks like a twig or thin tree branch standing up in the water. But when she decides to fly she is hard to miss as she looks like a prehistoric creature, some sort of pterodactyl, with her long beak, long hooked neck and immense wingspan, plus those long gangly legs. Not to mention she is quite blue.
Those big, long wings are so graceful that I can’t even describe it.
I’ve been playing in this creek since I was a child. Both the heron and the fish she eats are signs that a creek horribly polluted by industrial waste has found a new life. I’m glad to see it coming back.
Disagreement
Starlings
The starlings made a mess of the bird feeder, but they were certainly entertaining while they were at it. Heavens, the drama!
Spring Bath
Spring Bath
It was not warm today, but this sparrow couldn’t wait for his bath! His buddies were next, but actually thought better of it after being splashed pretty liberally. Or perhaps they didn’t need to actually get into the birdbath after that.
The birds are truly preparing for spring, singing away, pairing off, looking for nesting sites, and eating anything in sight.
Silly Wren
Silly Wren
Wrens always have to be different. I think this little one was overwhelmed by the choice of feeders on the deck.
Waiting for a Thaw
Waiting for the Thaw
Two doves are a little disappointed to find the bird bath is frozen with overnight temperatures below freezing. I guess they’ll just wait for it to thaw.
Instead, I’ll head out there with a teapot of warm water soon.
Wren Returns, 2010
Wren
This bossy little wren is likely a return from last year, finding the two feeders as soon as I hung and filled them. Here, she is on the post at the bottom of the steps to my deck debating which one to visit next. Whatever she decides, we are sure to hear about it.
I put out two more feeders today in the back yard and it was as if the birds had been hanging around waiting. They were immediately in the flat feeder with the mixed nuts, and then in the feeder out under the trees.
This usually means they are returning birds since they are well-acquainted with the accommodations. Welcome back!
Find the Killdeer in This Picture, 2010
Find the Killdeer in the Picture
There are six killdeer in this photo, cleverly camouflaged in their natural living and nesting habitat of rocks and pebbles in moving water.
I had focused on one of the birds, and saw a few others, but it wasn’t until I downloaded the images and opened them on my monitor that I saw all the others. Clever camouflage!
I took the photo along Chartiers Creek in Carnegie.
A story about killdeer actually inspired me to set up this daily photo blog, and they are the subject of my very first post on this blog: http://bernadettestoday.wordpress.com/2009/06/23/a-fathers-day-drama/. All birds are the centers of their own universes, but the killdeer’s self-absorption is comical—the parent birds do the “broken wing” routine with suspected predators, and it’s not at all convincing, especially when they are nesting in the gravel of the train tracks that run right through town. But I will admit, they are darned difficult to spot if they’re not moving.
Bird Baths Don’t Close on Labor Day, 2009
The pool is still open.
These sparrows will be able to take a dip well into October. The light isn’t quite right to catch all the water droplets splashing out of the birdbath, but you can see a few drops and the little waves. Sparrows never do anything individually, only as groups, and I watch them in all seasons conducting business in the big spruce in my front yard, and rising and falling like leaves to the feeder hanging in the maple very near the birdbath.
Can I Have Some Privacy?
Can I have some privacy?
A young male cardinal preens himself in a moment of morning sun in the spruce after having a bath in the fresh rainwater that filled the birdbath in last night’s storm.
Undecided Geese
Undecided Geese
The Canada geese were paddling along on Chartiers Creek as I made my late afternoon errands and they generally move with grace and composition, but they got all bunched up as they were going under the bridge—I think it was because the bridge has a pier in the center and some of them decided to go on the other side…and these guys just couldn’t decide what to do.
Then some goose took the initiative and everyone got in line. Geese like to know where they stand, or paddle.
Decided Geese
Hey…
Hey, wait a minute…
The geese were paddling along in formation on Chartiers Creek, but it looked to me as if one of them had another idea.
A Father’s Day Drama
Look at those legs!
Ahead of me on the Panhandle Trail just after the Oakdale crossing it suddenly looked as if the gravel was moving on its own. I was hot and a little tired but as I slowed I realized it wasn’t the gravel at all but a little family of killdeer out for a walk, two adults and three little ones.
Killdeer are related to sandpipers, so picture the long thin legs, narrow horizontal bodies and long beaks. You’ve no doubt heard a bird call a high-pitched “kill-deer! kill-deer!” just about anywhere but especially near water, even along the rivers in the city.
They nest in gravel, usually along streams, because their food source, insects are plentiful at the water’s edge. However, they will adapt to any gravel if a food source is near, and I’ve even seen them nesting in gravel between the rails of the railroad track. Their coloring, grey and tan with dark brown stripes around the neck and eyes, blends them in with the gravel, a perfect camouflage.
Until they start to move. Anyone seeing moving bits of gravel move around should at least look a little closer, and you may see the little ones, just a puff of soft feathers atop long skinny legs, marked just like their parents in miniature and just as loud as their parents but just saying the second syllable of their name only.
As soon as I stopped my bicycle and pulled out my camera, the little ones turned left and away from me, bibbling away in the opposite direction toward home, while their parents each did the “broken wing trick”—slowly hobbling along dragging one outspread wing as if they were injured, trying to lead me away from their babies and their nest.
Mind you, this family had just been dodging bicycles, but moving objects don’t really frighten them, only big ones that stop and look at them.
As soon as the babies were safely near their little crossover point, their parents joined them, making loud, sharp warning sounds.
And from here, it’s easy to anthropomorphize, especially when there are parent birds and baby birds involved. Even if they aren’t thinking and saying what humans would in this case, some things are universal, and the little drama probably went on like this…
All was well until one little guy decided he wasn’t quite ready to go home yet, and turned around and ran off, his little legs moving so fast he appeared to be hovering an inch or so above the ground.
Baby killdeer on the move!
Dad wasn’t happy. Apparently he had decided this was one day the kids should listen to him. But where had he gone? Perfect camouflage all around, the little one had disappeared.
He spotted the little guy and began trying to gently guide him back toward the crossover, which was quite a distance away. The little one would have none of it.
Then he tried to show the little guy how to cross the ditch, a much shorter route. Even a sibling, who had already crossed over, came to the other side of the barrier, calling to the little one (but probably yelling “chicken!”, as siblings will do…do birds call each other “chicken”?).
“Not me!” the little one said, probably a good decision since climbing or hopping over a 12-inch concrete barrier would be quite a feat for something the size of two cotton balls running around on toothpicks.
Then he realized he was all alone, and stopped.
Suddenly Dad was there, flying back and forth and landing to lead the little one to the other end of the barrier, standing on the other side and making, instead of the usual sharp warning sound, a soft, comforting chirring sound.
He finally led the little bit all the way down to the other end of the concrete barrier and convinced him to cross through the weedy strip where the concrete barrier ended, and they all made a ruckus when they got together again on the other side.
Then they blended into the pile of gravel on the other side of the barrier. Hope Dad had a good Father’s Day.
In the Sky: 2011
In the Sky
A crow harasses a very patient red-tailed hawk high up against the flat sky before a storm.
I followed a red-tailed hawk around this afternoon, trying to get the perfect photograph, but I did not succeed. The hawk was circling a fairly large valley that is a local county park, riding the thermals and gusts on an unusually hot day on the front of a storm. I couldn’t follow quickly enough on foot so I was actually driving my car and parking it, hopping out and looking at the sky for the hawk. It was always gracefully circling elsewhere, so I quit the pursuit and headed home, followed by the storm.
But I did remember this photo I’d taken several years ago with an older digital camera. The photo itself is a little grainy, but I like the interplay of the two birds in this one. The crow was really dive bombing the hawk and you can see a few feathers missing in one wing. But the hawk didn’t divert from its circling on the rising wind, and I presume the crow eventually lost interest.
And neither bird paid attention to the leading edge of the front just entering into the photo, the tip of a big thunderhead pushed along by winds. As today, it likely developed into a cataclysm of hot and cold air, then settled down into rain.
The Kissing Cardinals
The Kissing Cardinals
Cardinals will do this as a courtship ritual, feed each other seeds. I thought it was past the time for courtship for cardinals, but perhaps they are on a little honeymoon.
I wish the lighting had been a little different on this. There is a little sunlight on the cardinals, but because my neighbor’s steps are in full sun the birds were nearly silhouetted. A flash was not an option because I shot this through my front window and would have had only a flashed out window. But I’m so glad I finally caught them in the act—I’ve seen cardinals do this for years in the spring but haven’t been able to catch them in time.
Great Blue Heron: 2011
Great Blue Heron
I found her in her favorite morning fishing spot, though she grew angry and flew farther downstream before I had my camera ready. I readied my lens and crept to the top of the bank as off she flew!
This isn’t in a park or conservation area, this is right in the middle of Carnegie. I dropped my car off for service and walked back home, dipping down by the creek, studying a few industrial areas, walking down a few alleys instead of main streets and then walking on Main Street itself.
Chartiers Creek winds through the middle of town and beyond in both directions, and a colony of great blue herons nests about 11 miles away, considering the entirety of the creek’s channel as their hunting ground. For the most part the creek is less than a foot deep, and today the air turned slightly warmer again, warming the water and bringing out the small creek fish, carp and darters. The heron stands on the gravel on a shallow edge of the creek and as the fish swim between her legs she just reaches down with that long neck and picks them out of the water with her beak like tweezers.
When the heron is standing still in the water, she is so slender that she looks like a twig or thin tree branch standing up in the water. But when she decides to fly she is hard to miss as she looks like a prehistoric creature, some sort of pterodactyl, with her long beak, long hooked neck and immense wingspan, plus those long gangly legs. Not to mention she is quite blue.
Those big, long wings are so graceful that I can’t even describe it.
I’ve been playing in this creek since I was a child. Both the heron and the fish she eats are signs that a creek horribly polluted by industrial waste has found a new life. I’m glad to see it coming back.
Cardinal Says Hello
Cardinal Says Hello
An American Cardinal stops on the deck to tip his crest in our direction and say hello on a sunny late winter afternoon.
Living Spaces: 2011
Living Spaces
One of my avian neighbor’s homes is lit by the late afternoon sun with my human neighbor’s house in the background.
Both homes weathered the winter pretty well. This nest is a robin’s nest, and their construction ability never ceases to amaze me considering they have a beak and claws to carry and manipulate construction materials, including dirt to make the hardened insides. From what I can see, they build a bowl of sturdier grasses, twigs and sometimes interesting items like a watchband or the plastic markers I use to mark seedlings in my garden. Then they add a layer of mud, and impress softer materials like finer grass, feathers and the odds and ends of colored yarn I toss out in the yard for that purpose, into the mud as it dries. This nest hangs over the street and aside from residential traffic a pretty good gust will blow past, plus all the ice and snow we’ve had this winter. Soon they’ll be back to clean it up and the nest will be back in business.
Rosy
Rosy
The cardinal and the maple tree buds glow with the red of coming spring color.
The birds all assemble in the tree branches when I appear on the deck in the morning, so they are easy shots with my camera. They begin squawking at me when they realize I’m not filling the feeders right away, but until they get too upset and start hopping around I can capture a few special images.
A Cardinal Brightens Up the Morning
American Cardinal
One of many flashy cardinals who color my world on winter mornings. I’m sure he’s indicating that I haven’t been on the ball with filling the feeders and bird baths.
Disagreement
Starlings
The starlings made a mess of the bird feeder, but they were certainly entertaining while they were at it. Heavens, the drama!
A Snappy Dresser (2011)
A Snappy Dresser
Avian markings always fascinate me, and the stark black and white pattern with the little red hat on this red-bellied woodpecker is so intricate I couldn’t pass it up. The thing that’s so interesting about each bird’s feather pattern is that it has two distinctly different views: one with wings folded, like this, and quite another when wings are spread and flying.
This black and white checkerboard becomes black and white stripes when the big guy takes off; the male and female in this species of woodpecker are distinguished by the amount of red, the female only on the back of her neck, the male extending up and over the head to the beak. And despite all that red up top, there is a more rare red-headed woodpecker, so this species is named for a pretty insignificant amount of red on its belly.
I was so inspired by his outfit that I wore black and white with a red beret.
Here is a link to photos of other birds on this blog, mostly from my own backyard.
Among other sites on the internet, a great site to identify birds is All About Birds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. I also use my very battered copy of Peterson’s Guide to the Birds of North America; there are many others, but after 25 years I practically have mine memorized. Here’s a link to a new, updated edition that sounds pretty exciting.
I also have a number of articles on The Creative Cat (believe it or not) regarding managing a Backyard Wildlife Habitat and feeding and providing habitat for wild birds in your yard.
Dove Dissent
I saw you in another nest yesterday.
What were you doing there?
Can't I visit friends?
Yes, you and that slender little dovey were quite friendly!
