Acrobatics

Okay, okay. I know it’s been forever since I last wrote here, but February has turned out to be a far busier month than I had planned. One of the best parts of this week will come in a couple hours when I attend my first photography class! Sarah Reid and I will be attending together, so be sure to see to watch our progress on our photoblog at mozzarellapics.blogspot.com.

And now my reason for updating this afternoon. When I got back from a meeting in Binghamton this morning, I went to pick up my laptop from the house and looked out into the sunroom to see this:


Yup, that would indeed be a squirrel…on my window feeder. I at least have to give it props for its sheer acrobatic skills.

A Squirrelly Update

This squirrel was not thrilled to have me back home!

I had a great time in California and I hope to be able to find some time this week to regale you with some tales of my week out there. For now a quick update will have to suffice. Here's a recap:
Monday—traveled to California, saw lots of redwood trees (they really are huge!), heard lots of birds in the canopy of the redwoods
Tuesday—attended some quality workshops/plenary sessions; saw an Acorn Woodpecker
Wednesday—attended a great workshop with Bob Ditter; took train ride into Santa Cruz and walked on the beach and wharf; saw lots of gulls, a brown pelican, and several sea lions; and managed to get shoes wet in Monterey Bay
Thursday—sat outside to listen to morning plenary session
Friday—left beautiful weather to come back to the frozen tundra and…my new Canon Rebel XS!
Saturday—slept; discovered squirrels had discovered my feeders while I was away and nibbled a few holes in my sock feeder; played with my new camera.


A gorgeous day on the beach…

Shadow of the feeders on the pole

This week sort of flew by (no pun intended). The cold weather we’ve been experiencing lately gave way to a gorgeous, spring-like day today. It warmed up enough to allow me to re-hang the window feeder. I had barely gotten the door closed when the first red-breasted nuthatch landed on the feeder. If I didn’t know better I would have thought that it hadn’t eaten since the feeder came down last week!

The feeders continue to attract several dozen birds every day (I lost count at twenty-six at the other day.) I even came downstairs the other morning to find a Mourning Dove (Zenaida macroura) visiting the yard. I hadn’t seen one in the yard since this fall. I haven’t seen it return yet, so it may have been just passing through the area, but it was still a pleasant sighting.

I’m hoping to see lots of new birds next week when I am in California for the United Methodist Camp & Retreat Leaders’ Gathering. There are apparently several stands of redwoods at the conference center where we’ll be staying. I most certainly will be packing my small binoculars and camera, which will hopefully come in handy for the John Muir workshop I signed-up for. Luckily for the birds, I’ve made arrangements for Kevin to fill the feeders while I’m gone. Hopefully he won’t spoil them with any of his delicious culinary treats (which you can read about here.)

As I’m not sure that I’ll have access to the internet—or even the time—while at Mt. Hermon, you might have wait another week for the next update. Until then, happy birding!

Snowy Sunday

We received a good six to seven inches of fresh powder overnight here at the Lake and a light snow has continued to fall throughout the day. I’m not always a fan of driving in the stuff, but I do love the way snow makes everything look. The bitter cold weather seems to have passed and my feathered friends seemed to have managed to survive. Unfortunately the same cannot be said of my window feeder. As I went to clean it out on Friday afternoon, one of the suction cups slid and that was that. It is now sitting inside waiting for slightly warmer temperatures to make an appearance. (In order for the suction cups to actually hold the temperature needs to be above freezing.)

There has been a steady stream of visitors at the other feeders over the weekend. The cold weather and snow doesn’t seem to slow the birds down at all. Yesterday I did notice that there was more seed mix on the ground below the feeders than usual. A few minutes later I think I figures out the reason—I saw a blue jay scrunched up at the wooden feeder trying to get some food. I wish that I had had my camera at that moment, because the whole scenario was just too funny. It didn’t seem to be intentionally throwing seed down to the ground, but the sheer weight of the bird made the feeder tip quite a bit (to the point where I thought the jay might fall off.) It was quite humorous to watch. Guess the feeder is smaller than I thought…

I committed a faux pas yesterday and didn’t refill the feeders before the sun went down. One of the outcomes though, was that the chickadees finally started nibbling on the suet that I had put out a couple weeks ago. I was beginning to think I had gotten the wrong kind of suet, but they seemed to enjoy it this morning, so I may hold off on getting another cake until the current one is gone.

I leave you with a shot I got yesterday of two siskins munching away on nyger seed that had fallen from the sock feeder. (A lot more seed falls from the sock feeder when it’s almost empty…)

Blue Jay

I wrote a couple weeks ago about my excitement at hearing some Blue Jays (Cyanocitta cristata) in the yard. For the last couple of weeks, I have been attempting to get a snap shot of one in the yard. Unfortunately, it just hadn’t worked out until today. It turns out that blue jays are quite skittish and apparently have phenomenal eye sight. Each time I stood to get closer to the window, the jay would fly away.

When I came home for lunch (which has become my primary daily bird watching time) today, I saw a white-breasted nuthatch at the wooden feeder. So I picked up my camera from the coffee table and zoomed in. I’m am by no means thrilled with the digital zoom, but I was able to get the best shot to date of this little bird that is also frustratingly skittish. After it flew away I put my camera down so I could each my bowl of ravioli. I was about half-way through when I saw a jay zoom by the window. I quickly picked up my camera in the hopes that it would land near the feeder. A few seconds later, it did so and I was able to get a few shots off. The shots I got weren’t high quality, but I was thrilled to have finally gotten any shot in which a blue jay could be distinguished!


A Blue Jay looking inquisitively at a Dark-eyed Junco

About ten minutes later another jay shows up and I got a couple more shots before it flew off. Then the nuthatch returned and I was able to get an even better shot of it. I was about ready to put my camera down when the jay showed up again. As it was searching for the perfect seed, a junco landed and, even though I was implementing the digital zoom, I captured some cool shots of the two of them pecking around. Then another jay showed up and was joined a moment later by a third one. I was like a little kid in a candy shop!


Two jays visiting the yard

Blue jays are certainly fun to watch and their varieties of calls are as unmistakable as their coloration. I have not personally heard it yet, but blue jays can apparently mimic the call of a hawk. After observing the smaller birds, blue jays look huge in comparison. This is particularly noticeable in the pictures I got of the jay and junco together (the junco itself is noticeably larger than the chickadees, gold finches, siskins, etc. that visit the feeders.) I’ve read on a couple other blogs that in some communities, jays have been known to become a bit of a nuisance by hogging feeders. I am keeping an eye on the jays, but for now they seem to only temporarily scare off the other birds. Fortunately for the smaller birds, my feeders are not sufficiently large enough for jays to land upon. Fortunately for the jays (and the ground-feeding junco) the other birds toss enough seeds overboard to keep them happy. A final observation I have made is that jays generally do not eat directly below the feeders; preferring instead to grab a couple of seeds and head to a nearby bush to crack the seeds open and enjoy the meat inside.

As a side note, the first deep freeze of the winter arrived overnight. So far the birds don’t seem to mind the bitter cold, although I did notice the seed mix in the feeders did seem to disappear a little quicker today…

When I imported the photo files onto my computer earlier today, I noticed a few frames where the pole appeared to have swallowed a jay and I found it rather humorous. Here’s a collage of that series for your enjoyment: