What's at your birdfeeder?

“Well, I'm back to thinking the "faded" oriole is a female with atypical darker head, as it showed up last evening with a male, and when another male oriole showed and gave it some crap, the first male stepped in and sent the second boy flying. Must be a pair.”

“Pekka your killin' me. You are too funny.

Right now the red winged black birds just chased all the other birds away. Cardinals, painted buntings and a tufted titmouse.”

“A pair of Western Tanagers showed up in my backyard this weekend, the first I've seen in Western Oregon.”

“My wife was at her parents' this weekend and saw 8 male orioles at their feeder. They've never seen that many.”

“tango, maybe it's a crossdressing male or a butch female...hmmm, birds are just so dang flighty, lol.

Going through a lot of seed these days, that's the one thing I know for sure.”

“It’s not at my feeder, it’s on my front door.

My wife hung one of those eucalyptus wreaths on our front door and a couple of finches built a nest on top of it. We can stand on a chair and look down into the nest from about six inches away. We’ve had four baby birds to watch since Tuesday. This is really cool! I’ve never been able to observe this so well.”

“The finch nest in my hanging petunia plant started with 7 eggs and only 1 hatched. The other eggs disappeared one by one.

The baby is now a "Baby Huey" and is bigger than mama finch. It's really funny watching mama standing on the rail near the nest squawking at junior to get out and fly. He gets out of the nest, waddles near the edge, flutters his wings several times, and goes back to the nest and sleeps.

He has done this several times this week. One of these times he'll make the plunge. Either that or he'll get so fat the plant will come down.”

“Pennsy Hiker, I think what you may have there is a Brown-Headed Cowbird, they lay their eggs in another bird nest and either push the original egg out of the nest or eating them, the foster parents then feed and raise them as their own. Ref. Golden Field guide to Field Identification BIRDS of North America and The Audubon Society Field Guide to North American Birds”

“I just loaded my feeders up this morning and was watching some jays feeding, and here comes the squirrel, all of a sudden a flash of brown and the squirrel is now Red Shoulder Hawk Food. Hawks 1 Squirrels 0 "GO HAWK's"”

“The cat's still there.”

“but mocking birds nested in the big cedar (fledged already), tiny wrens nested in the small cedar (three teeny-tiny little things), blue birds are on their second go round in the corner fence post, swifts on the porch ledge (not hatched yet), and brown thrashers in the front hedge (fledged).”

“Birds that go crazy!

8)”

“Fill in the details.

Is your cat still at the bird feeder because it's too dumb to catch a bird, or because its been so sucessful?”

“....The cat just likes birds!

8)”

“Nah, just wishfull thinking, probably. She's way too old to catch 'em.”

“The cats still at the feeder because Father Goose is too dumb to catch the cat.

Sorry FG, but you knew someone had to say it.
;-)”

“Say what you will of me, but don't you dawg my cute little pu$$y! LOL!”

“Remember Father Goose admitted that he sometimes joins the cat when she/he/it stands in the middle of the room and seems to howl at nothing!

(See earlier post.)”

“OMFG! Not quite, Stump. I never claimed to howl a duet with my cat. If we ever do, though, maybe Stratdewd could put it to music. Might go over big with the head-banger crowd. ;-)
Hey, I thought you were changing your name. How's about Rumpstrider? :0”

“lol

But no concensus, other than people like "poking" fun at my name. 8-)”

“enature.com has some really good birdcall files. I was just tormenting my parents dog with this. Dog went nuts!”

“If yo want to search for sounds try http://www.findsounds.com/
It's great!”

“

”

“Now that's cute.”

“Don't forget to collect the down so you can make your own gear in a few years.”

“We had a robin nesting in the window by the front door. And a blue jay in the back kitchen window.It was nice to see them raising there young.”

“Why does Father Goose have a cat?”

“Hey, Stump, you got sumpin' agin' cats?”

“It just seems odd that a "Goose" has a "cat."”

“I know of a goose with a cat,
who wears a Panama hat.
The cat, not the goose,
though she has a screw loose,
knows that TTin's all where it's at.”

“saw a Brown Thrasher feeding in the back yard - at first I thought it was a Wood Thrush but upon closer examination decided it was a Brown Thrasher”

“My thistle feeder was empty this morning, then I noticed the pieces of it on the ground. My dog is gonna get a workout!!”

“I just had a smallish hawk piledrive itself into my back door 3 times. Scared the pi$$ out of my porch cat. THe bird was stunned on the porch for 10 minutes, then up into the tree where it's been hanging out for about 20 minutes now. It's medium and dark brown with an ivory breast with dark brown flecks and yellow feet. Every time I look out the back bedroom window at it it looks right back at me.”

“Try very hard not to look like a mouse.”

“I was wondering if it was after a lizard or decided on the cat.”

“It's a juvenile red-tailed hawk.”

“It probably saw the reflection of the sky in the glass of your door and tried to fly into what it thought was the sky. This is a fairly common occurrence with birds.”

“and drunks”

“Nobody walked into any doors or windows at the shelter!”

“The back door is under heavy tree cover, so it may have just looked liked more trees with a white grid on them. It's still hanging out.”

“no just outhouses”

“Let the cat out and the show begin. It would be like an episode of Wild America.”

“Nope, no interest in the porch cat. Its still hanging out in the tree outside the bedroom window. When I go to the window it looks at me. Its quite small, only a little over a foot tall. I think it just left the nest.”

“I wish a hawk would take Psycho Squirrel off my hands.”

“Bluejays have been divebombing her for a while and she doesn't respond at all. That's not good.”

“It's a CHICKEN-HAWK!!

. . .or maybe treebait was right.

Check out: Red-tailed hawk ”

“Yep, that's her. She just got chased into another tree by a whole group of jays. She's not flying very well.”

“robins are trying to scare her awy because she is to close to there nest. she will sit there all day and not care about the birds divebombing her. i watched a red tail hawk fresh out of her nest her in central park for hours. she did nothing at all but sit there. i would worry if she is still there after dark.”

“oh,,,like duh.
You started this post treebait. I'm feeling too stupid to remain at work for the day.

The red-tailed hawk link is actually from the Birds of Prey Foundation.

There might be some information for you to use there if the chicken-hawk's health starts to go down hill.”

“Those are not good signs Treebait. I don't know whether you have a wildlife rehab center near you or not, but they might be able to help if the hawk is accessible to rescue, but if it is flying at all they would not be able to corral it.

Hopefully it has had the wind knocked out of it and is stunned. Maybe it will recover and be okay, but if it gets worse and could be rescued the rehab folks would know what to do.

I'd strongly suggest you not try to aid it yourself. Their claws and beaks are razor sharp.

Ultimately, you can't play God. Sometimes nature just has to play itself out and all we can do is observe and learn.”