Wild Wild Woods

We are getting ready for FeederWatch, the citizen-science project online for the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.  The “guild” of winter birds is...

The Blue Jay, molting into his new feathers, will look drastically better when his neck is feathered fully and the crest on his head grow...

Day by day, the juvenile birds that hatched in and around the wild woods this summer are getting their adult feathers.  The young White B...

Several bird pairs have fledged their babies out of the nests in the wild woods.  This young Eastern Bluebird happily comes to the plate ...

The adult Gray Catbirds gather food, mainly insects, for their young.  They also love berries; by mid-June, they had eaten every last berr...

Enchanter’s Nightshade Circaea lutetiana blooms during the summer in this wild woods.  Its tiny flowers are displayed in loosely arranged s...

The Gray Catbirds Dumetella carolinensis were in the wild woods last summer, sounding like cats mewing in the understory.  This year, we ...

There is enough open space among the lawns around the woods for Eastern Bluebirds Sialia sialis to hunt insects for their growing fami...

  The Black-capped Chickadees Poecile atricapillus nested in the tube, incubated six eggs, and now have all those chirping babies to feed.

The nestboxes and snag tubes are full of nests.  A walk through the wild woods helped locate a few more nests.  And, today we noticed a fled...

This "snag tube" is based on a design tested and recommended by researchers at Cornell.  http://www.birds.cornell.edu/ We have...

This big gray hawk is probably an adult Coopers Accipiter cooperii .  He was very inquisitive, searching around in the adjacent back yard...

The Red-bellied Woodpeckers have been at our feeders all winter.  Still nearby in the woods, we hear them calling to one another.  Today t...

The larch branches still bear cones from last year while this year's new cones open among them. The larch Larix laricina is also known a...

The first Jack-in-the-Pulpit Arisaema triphyllum this season seems to be too green and bright; usually they are more secretive in shades ...

The maple trees are blooming.  When the first blossoms on this variety Acer rubrum appear, they are golden; they become red in just a few d...

The warm winter continues! Trees are budding, tulips tiptoeing up through the mulch, and shrubs are sprouting blossoms. Robins have arrive...

This winter, we have much less snow than normal. On one morning when there was snow cover, it was a bit easier to spot birds in and around t...

The edge of the woods is home for mice and voles, so this hawk may find good hunting among the grasses and the brush pile.

The Northern Cardinals Cardinalis cardinalis in the guild this winter gather in the sunny brambles to warm up. These two females were t...

The autumn colors on the maple tree make a beautiful backdrop for the peanut log, no matter the color of the birds feasting there.

The volunteer sunflowers are blooming -- right under the seed station, ready for the birds, with a little extra protein.