Daily Bird Pictures, Volume 459

seems like years away

We see news footage every day on your horror winter. It's impossible for me to fathom what it must be like.

Note: so called 'average snow in Boston area is 43". Now nearing 100", most since 1934. Note: I was not here at that time. ☺

That has been some snow. The most since we moved out here in Iowa was 69 inches for the season. I cannot fathom what they are getting.

Lily_love, based on the shape, I think your Grebe is a Pied-billed.

Spring is getting closer as the Meadowlarks are singing more often. I admit, I miss winter when there is no more risk of snow.

Here's an American Tree Sparrow that's figured how to cling to the suet feeder. It struggled for a time, but finally mastered it.

Ditto to Pied-billed Grebe.

Haven't had so much as a total of one centimetre of snow yet over the whole of the winter so far here. 55°N latitude. ;-)

Resin

Thank you both to Chillybean and Resin for the i.d. and confirmation of my Grebe. Awww, Resin, good on you. Our part of the State is under arctic storm watch, grrrr. I'm so ready for Spring but spring isn't anywhere near. Margaret, it has been so cold here, I hope we won't lose some buds (flowers and leaf buds), it has been rather a bad winter for us thus far. The birds are well fed here in my backyard, however. :)
Chillybean, I hope your Meadowlarks singing, will sing more, and more. lol

100 inches of snow here this winter. We will send you some. Saw a Robin perched on a branch of our tulip poplar this afternoon. Perhaps had bee looking for seed fallen from our bird feeder in the front garden.

These winter migratory birds, a delight find during our dreary wintery days.

p.s. I.D. pending....

Not the best picture, but our Kestrel is still here, so is still finding food. This winter is finding fewer mice getting into the house. YAY! She has perched on our new box a time or two, so might stay here long enough for a male to come. But then the old female may come too and there could be a dispute.

Maybe I talked about this in another thread. The past two years we had a pair of Kestrels take over the nesting box. Both summers eggs were laid, but never hatched.

We live out in the country and placed our first Kestrel box on a corner post next to the road, since the county roads people put up boxes along the roads like that. We are thinking there's ten to twenty feet between the edge of the road and fence line. Our road is gravel, so not as heavily used. We wonder if that was the problem; the Kestrels couldn't get used to our traffic. They would always fly off when a vehicle passed by.

Because we have good habitat, two hatch year Kestrels (male and female) were released here in late July. They were from different nests, but had each fallen out too soon for some reason. The rehabilitator kept them until they were older The male went off elsewhere. I think I read somewhere that during winter they stay in different habitats.

A child built a box a little deeper than the original and we put it further from the road. Only one box is up, since we only had one post.

We've seen her perch on the new box while trucks pass by, and she stays there. Just south of that box is row crop, so I hope that the short times the farmers are there will not disturb any nesting activities. They don't live on that property, so they are there minimally. Tilling, planting, spraying (ugh), and then harvest later in the season.

This last photo shows Kessie's favourite roosting spot, an old Barn Swallows' nest in the three-sided building of ours. (The previous owner used it for his horses.) There is a large pile of pellets and other below this spot. The reason for that board in front is I read some place that you can get more Barn Swallows to nest in a building if you put up dividers. Hasn't worked for us so far. We think Kessie feels safer behind it.

Thanks Resin for the i.d. Chillybean, thanks for sharing your thoughts on the Kestrels couple. Hopefully their nesting will be successful this Spring.

Funny view of tufted titmouse.

Nice picture of the Tufted Titmouse JulieQ.

Thank you, Lily_love, we hope there is a successful brood, too. We are thinking we'll give this box a couple of years and if they both fail again, we'll just take it down. The box is far enough from the house that we can wander around and they seem to not fly off, but maybe there is something we just do not know.

Not only does she perch on our Tree Swallow box while hunting or resting, she uses one of the Chimney Swift towers to get a good view. After breeding season kicks in, the Swallows are good about protecting their little space and the Kestrels stay closer to their box. so I am not concerned that Kessie will be a problem later. :)

I would like to think she is becoming accustomed to me, since she was perched on this tower when I was out in the feeding area filling things up yesterday. The distance between the two areas is not very far.

Shot today - Purple Finch!

Thanks

Don

dwr857,

A very pretty bird. :) This looks like a House Finch to me. I see a hint of brown on the top, and the facial marking is not as distinct as a Purple.

Purple finches seem to be a bit chunkier in build than a house finch & the males with heavier color here.

Hello and thanks for the feedback. Before posting this I went to my Bird field guide and barely made the determination this was a Purple Finch but could easily be a House Finch. I then looked at miltiple books and each say distinguishing the difference can be very difficult as all birds are not marked the same! With all that said and another search through the books I have to agree that this is a House Finch......

Thanks so much! Don

Don, once you see one, you'll get the hang of it.

House finch left, Purple Finch Right. Notice the eyebrow.

Very nice comparison photo, Mrs_Ed. Yes, I agree, once you see one, you can clearly see the difference. I remember one winter fussing over every female House Finch wondering if it was a Pine Siskin. Yet when I finally did see one, there was no doubt.

very helpful, Mrs. Ed. confirms that the birds which come to our feeder ARE purple finches.

We've visitors! Thousand of these wonderful birds passing through our area lake today.

lovely!

Wow, Kim, that's incredible!

Thanks irisMA and Margaret, it truly was a marvelous experience. I'm so thankful Jim and I had the opportunity to witness such wonderful happening right on our back yard.

American White Pelicans are some of my favorites, especially to watch in flight. They fly in formation and when they bank and catch the sun, they look silver, like they are planes or something.

Thank you Mrs_Ed for the great comparison!

Don

What a treat to see a flock of White Pelicans like that! They sure like the warm weather, every now and then we see them here in NC but not often......

Don

This Great Blue Heron allowed me to get very close so I could capture this Portrait. Such a prehistoric looking bird, easy to find, and fun to watch!

Don

Nice GBH pic Don. It appeared that a fraction of the flock decided to stay over night with us for we are experiencing a wild winter storm; yesterday temp was nearly 80F. Degree. Today temp dropped and stayed below freezing!

110 posts . . . a volunteer to start Volume 460, please!

Resin

Edit: please head to Volume 460 here: http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/1387902/


This message was edited Mar 6, 2015 4:48 PM

TheHackster - about one of your original pictures in this thread. I had a bald headed cardinal in my yard several years ago. Kind of freaky looking. I was sure he was sick and wouldn't make it. It was nice to read the post from nutsaboutnature that cardinals with that condition aren't to uncommon and its isn't permanent.

This is the birds we have out in a farmers field, can anyone tell me what it is?