differences

Some birds confuse me!  These two often up show in the feeder garden.  The female Red-wing Blackbird (top) has a long pointed beak for gleaning cattail seeds in the grassy pond area where they nest.  The female Rose-breasted Grosbeak (bottom) has a thicker beak for opening the bigger seeds they prefer.  Their male mates are bright and flashy, but these females wear a softly speckled breast and subtle coloring to avoid being noticed as they nest and raise their defenseless chicks.  Each has a beak that is best suited for the food they prefer.

suet for Spring birds

Brown Thrasher

Baltimore Oriole, male

Every bird loves suet at this time of the year.  Their efforts -- whether to migrate, find a mate, define territory, or build a nest -- all take energy.  Suet provides it when the insects are not quite plentiful enough this early in our "late" Spring.

wrens

Several House Wrens Troglodytes aedon have invaded the wild wild woods.
Only about 4.5 inches long, they are tiny melodious singers in the trees.

But in an effort to please his mate, a male will fill several boxes or tree cavities with small twigs, preventing other species from using those nesting sites.

The female Wren will choose one twig-filled cavity or nestbox and place soft material at the bottom.  The twigs create a scaffold that serves as a shield against predators. In her chosen hideaway, she will lay a clutch of eggs.

Grosbeak

Rosebreasted Grosbeak Pheucticus ludovicianus pair are nesting somewhere nearby in the wild wild woods.  The female is dressed in brown-gray camouflage pattern so she can hide her eggs among the trees; the male sports a rose front to contrast with his black and white tuxedo. Both come to the feeder tray for seed.  But they won't let me know where their nest is!

pussywillow bloom

fox sparrows migrating

Over the last week, through blizzard winds and huge snows, a lone Fox Sparrow seemed stranded alone among the Dark-eyed Junco flock sheltering in my feeder garden.  Today, with clearing weather south of here, several Fox Sparrows joined the first one.  They are ground feeders, kicking and hopping in leaf litter to expose bugs and seeds.  With a hard crusty snow cover on much of the ground, some of the hopping motions take maximum energy to be productive!

 

filling the larder with suet

Red-bellied Woodpecker gathering suet from the hanging feeder cage.

Red-bellied Woodpecker caching suet in a hiding place for later.

winter birds . . . as winter continues

Snow again.  I've been away since January. This is mid-April.  Almost 80 inches of snow this winter. I've resorted to putting out a plate of seeds for the birds rather than wade through deep drifts between the house and the hanging feeders.  It warmed up a bit last week; many migrating birds are now stuck here.

winter birds

Snow today, and the birds are more visible than over the last few weeks with no snow.  The Bluejays and Northern Cardinals are willing to sit together for a meal as the temperature drops and the wind increases.

photo credit gwp

peanuts and suet

Below zero F air temperature.  Wind makes it feel even colder.  Clouds and snow flurries prevent any warmth from sunshine.

The suet is popular with several species.  They do not mind close association when it comes to getting nourishment on a cold day.  Here, a Downy Woodpecker and Black-capped Chickadee partake as a Dark-eyed Junco (with claws more suited for finding seeds on the ground) tries to figure out the best way to hang and feed as the others.

Meanwhile, the new peanut ring attracts the Bluejays.  The Chickadees and Nuthatches explored it immediately.  The Bluejays were more cautious but their curiosity led them to solving the puzzle of this feeder.

Redpolls in winter

 Common Redpolls Acanthis flammea spend most of the year in the arctic tundra and boreal forests. Although they breed in the far north, flocks of Redpolls wander south in winter months to find food in woodlands, open fields, and backyard feeders.  Their striped breast and bright red forehead patch differentiate them from House Finches with a thicker bill and more rosey red around the face.  Left: a flock of Redpolls on the seed tray.  Below: a Redpoll looking down on a House Finch on a branch in winter.

feeder garden bandits

 Although the feeder garden is intended to feed birds, the squirrels find it enticing too.  The Red Squirrel Tamiasciurus hudsonicus usually gathers food on the ground below the tray of seeds.  The Grey Squirrel Sciurus carolinensis prefers to find ways to leap on the tray, dropping from a branch above or leaping from a stump nearby.  The tray is on a pole with a "slinky" metal coil suspended -- which the squirrels do not climb.

winter feeder garden

The feeder garden at the edge of the woods offers nuts, seeds, and suet to birds in a tray, baskets, tubes, and NEW a peanut ring.  They were pecking nuts out of the peanut ring within an hour.  Snow on the ground, temperatures around zero.  The Northern Cardinals are a bright spot in the scene.

fallen leaves

Maple, elm, mulberry, swamp oak, birch, and willow leaves create a palette of October color.  It helps the finches and doves appear less visible as they feed. The hawks circle overhead.

Bluejay bully

A Northern Cardinal was enjoying safflower seeds at the tray feeder this morning.  The Bluejays wanted the peanuts from the same tray.  The Cardinal held his ground, barking at the jays to go away.  They barked back, and grabbed peanuts as they could, then flew away to bury each one.

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migrating painted ladies

The garden was aflutter last week with Painted Lady butterflies Vanessa cardui.  They were obsessed with the blossoms of Brazilian Vervain Verbena bonariensis.  Fortunately, the lavender blooms are abundant this year, probably self-seeded from last year's single pot of the plant.  I was beginning to think I had too many of the tall strong stems topped with airy umbrellas of tiny flowers.  Now, glad they invited the ladies to stop for refueling on their way south!

creatures in the rain barrel

 

Deep in the nearly-empty rain barrel, a Gray Treefrog Hyla versicolor clings with its suction-cup feet.  Tree frogs can climb most surfaces with ease -- even this slick dark wall -- because each pad on each foot allows strong close mucous-enhanced contact. 

Outside the rain barrel, a Northern Walkingstick Diapheromera femorata clings to the outer edge on a surface of the same material.
Walkingsticks are leaf skeletonisers, eating the tissues between the leaf veins, pausing for a while and then walking on to new leaves.

Posing on a green leaf, the Walkingstick shows off its twig disguise and demonstrates how its front legs are attached just behind its eyes.  Usually, these two front appendages are held straight out along the antennae.

Yellow Goats Beard

The seed head of the Yellow Goats Beard Tragopogon dubius is a fluffy ball 3-1/2 inches across. The elongated seeds stand stiffly forming a ball.  Each seed has brown hairs at the top forming a tiny 'umbrella' plume; when ripe, the seeds release at the bottom and breezes help the plume carry them to next season's growing site.  This is one of Mother Nature's methods for seed dispersal.

Yellow Goats Beard blossom

juvenile Bluebird

This little Eastern Bluebird comes from the first clutch of eggs laid and hatched in the nestbox.  The adults have started clutch number two with eggs in the nest.

mushrooms

The woods is full of mushrooms.  These are growing on a downed buckthorn branch.

bright blooms in the shade

False Solomon's Seal Maianthemum racemosum or Smilacina racemosa blooms brightly in the shady woods.  The blossom is a stalk bearing clusters of tiny star-shaped flowers.  With its bloom, each plant stretches the appearance of its long curving stem. Later this summer the plant will  have a cluster of waxy berries.

mealworms for nestlings

A beautiful morning.  I put a fresh supply of mealworms in the plate.  Eastern Bluebirds, nesting in the distant box, are the first to gather breakfast for their babies.  What more can I say?

bee on cranesbill

While admiring the Cranesbill 'Karmina' in the gardens today, I noticed a fuzzy bee hurrying from one to another of the blooms that are just beginning to open.  I believe it is a Carpenter Bee Xylocopa virginica, commonly a nester in various types of wood; they eat pollen and nectar.

sweet woodruff blooms among the creeping charlie

At the edge of the wild wild woods . . .  this year, the ground ivy has crept into the Sweet Woodruff Galium odoratum.  Their blooms complement one another nicely in the shade.  Ground Ivy, Glechoma hederacea is also known as the invasive "creeping charlie" but I begged some to fill an area where nothing else pretty would grow; thanks Linde!

nestwatch update

Peek inside some of the nestboxes in the wild wild woods . . .

This box (above) holds a Tree Swallow nest -- a cozy cup formed of grasses with feathers for additional warmth. As she laid the eggs, one each day, she hid them under the feathers until she was ready to incubate them. 
Now they are clustered together; she sits with her body pressed close to them until they hatch.
The nylon lines suspended on this nestbox deter other species from claiming all the boxes; Tree Swallows and Bluebirds are aerial feeders and can maneuver between the lines to access this box.

Five Eastern Bluebird eggs are cozy in their nest cup of woven grasses.  This nestbox was lined with a deep soft cushion of moss by Chickadees before the Bluebirds took possession.









That pair of Black-capped Chickadees moved to another nestbox where they laid a clutch of 7 eggs.  Six babies hatched and five survived a wet cold week of weather.  They all gape hungrily when a parent brings food. The little one on the left is closing his beak after gulping an insect.  The others are still calling for a meal as the adult departs to hunt another.


In another nestbox, House Wrens have woven a grass shelter within a twig structure (below).  Two eggs so far; they usually lay 5 or 6, sometimes as many as 10.