Favorite Backyard Garden Birds?

[digitS']

Tom has grouse because his backyard includes a forest. My garden usually has Valley quail but not so much last year and I've seen none out there in 2015. There really seem to be more Sharp-shinned hawks around and I wonder if that explains it.

I learned that quail like ripe tomatoes. Their cousins, the Ring-neck pheasants like lettuce and to dust bathe in seed beds! <insert smiley throwing his hands in the air and going, "Gah!"> The neighbor ran a turkey off last year, for which I was much appreciative. Happy to have a flock of turkeys coming through a garden??! I don't think so ...

Dusky grouse aren't likely to come down into our gardens but I find the migration of these birds intriguing. They move down into the valleys in the spring to breed and raise their young. Then, they move higher in the mountains in the winter to feed on the needles of evergreens! Imagine making that choice for your winter home.

Steve

[A Happy Seedling]

I love quail. The feathers on the tops of their heads make them so adorable!

[tomf]

We see quail around but only sometimes. I was in Lake County California and we say a ton of wild turkeys.

[puzzlejunky]

Birds creep me out. Did you know crows will actually tell all its little crow friends about you if you're mean?

https://www.nbcnews.com/id/43570666/ns/t ... TZ01SGrSCg

Sorry for being a little off-topic..but the talking ones are really creepy. It's just not natural.

I'll leave now and leave everyone else to their appreciation of them...they just kinda scare the bejeebus out of me.

[applestar]

That was an interesting article!

[A Happy Seedling]

I love birds. I have cardinal eggs; Ace and Kivven's.

[digitS']

Not many birds just outside of Pittsburgh Pennsylvania, zone 6?

I'd probably be in a blind panic most of the time if birds bothered me . I've never been attacked by a bird ... oh, Wait a minute. There were that rooster and that gander ...

Years apart. I think I had the same response for both. I had my gloves in one hand and slapped 'em. They didn't accept the challenge.

It may not be wise to say so but I named a rooster Satan. He was just too much trouble with the other chickens. I didn't tell the people I gave him to what I called that rooster ... I wonder what happened to him ..?

Steve

[Seedsofchange]

I like the Carolina Wren too. Is anyone in here involved with community gardens or just gardens at home?

[pinksand]

I've had Carolina Wrens nest in my flower pots for the past couple of years but last year my puppy got to the eggs while I was distracted watering the plants. I had a little burial ceremony for the nest of crushed embryos The year before I got to watch those babies hatch and grow and then awkwardly leave the nest for the first time all from about 2 feet away through my sliding glass door.

Last summer the Gold finches seemed to constantly be perched on my zinnias. I'd pull into the driveway or walk out the front door to a shivering plant and flash of gold. I love them and don't mind them snacking a bit on my flower seeds.

I love all my bird visitors with the exception of the turkey vultures. I know they're on clean up crew and are important, but ick!

[A Happy Seedling]

Awww sad! I like goldfinches.

[A Happy Seedling]

I saw Swallow-Tailed Kites!
First last week, then more and more over the past week.
Haven't seen those agile little raptors since I vacationed in Florida; they are my favorite bird.
I wanted to tell you guys about what happened in Florida; very strange & funny.
One of the kites is especially familiar with me and vice versa, so I know where her nest is. She left to find food for her chicks, and in a few minutes, a herring gull came with a wriggling gull chick and dumped it in the kite nest with the kite chicks. It then flew off. The kite chicks poked and prodded the gull chick with their wings, and they made noises at each other. The gull chick sat there like the new kid in school. The parent kite came back and fed all the kite chicks, but not the gull. The gull complained loudly, and the kite fed it. Then the kite grabbed the chick and returned it to its mother's nest once the mother was gone! Then it returned to the nest like nothing had happened.

Never thought I'd see something like that, until I did.

Also, I'll be posting some backyard feeder bird photos soon!

[imafan26]

The golden plover are back and I am seeing more of the Northern cardinals.

We have a lot of the non-related crested cardinals, bulbuls, mynas, and spotted doves all of the time. Not to mention feral chickens, although the state is starting to round them up since they are everywhere and recently many were found dead and dying because someone was poisoning them.

[digitS']

I believe I saw a robin today. It showed up in a walnut tree across the road.

The robin was there about the first of December . For all I know, it's the same bird. Sitting down here at home, the 3 most common places to find me all have a view of that tree. The chairs and 3 windows all line up right.

I could claim that a robin has sat in that tree once every 6 weeks since October. Ha! Might be true. I think that there are very few over-wintering and I've seen them no where else. It is a blue-sky, snow-covered landscape day! Yesterday, overcast, and even without snow or rain that day, the streetlights were still on at 10:15 AM! ... If I had wings ... !

Ah well, the robins will all be back by spring.

Steve

[gumbo2176]

I'm in the middle of an urban environment and even though we have several different birds that frequent my yard, they seem to be far outnumbered by the pigeons, or winged rats, as I like to refer to them. I do have lots of sparrows, mockingbirds, grackles, and to a lesser extent, doves, cardinals, blue jays and the occasional hummingbird.

There are also quite a few of the smaller breed parrots that are getting to be a fixture in the warmer months when the fruit trees are in bloom. When the Loquat, or Japanese Plum trees are fruiting, they fly in droves to pick the trees clean. So far I've been lucky and they have either not discovered my fig tree, or they simply don't like the fruit it produces.

My wife's favorite are the hummingbirds that come to our 2nd floor back porch to dine on the flowers we have in hanging baskets and in pots.

[HoneyBerry]

Nice woodpecker! I love woodpeckers. I have a regular that I see pecking on my lilac tree once in a while.
I have been sharing my cockatiel's millet with the juncos outside. So now I can enjoy the juncos as well as my normal finches and chickadees. The juncos don't eat the sunflower seeds that I put out but they sure do like the millet seed. And they are ground feeders so I am feeding them differently. They even build their nests on the ground. I found a junco nest in my long grass once. I was protective of it. The baby birds seemed so vulnerable so low on the ground.

[digitS']

I hadn't realized that they had such a wide territory!

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Downy_Woodpecker/id

That's year round, folks . That Downy has got the "adapt to local conditions" skills down pat!

Steve

[LIcenter]

I hadn't realized that they had such a wide territory!

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Downy_Woodpecker/id

That's year round, folks . That Downy has got the "adapt to local conditions" skills down pat!

Steve

We've had an explosion of Downy's this year. Normally once a week I'll hang out at my local bird feed store to chew the fat for an hour or two. Just about everyone has commented on seeing an unusual abundance of this little cutey. That and Goldfinches.

[tommyr]

Hummingbirds and Cardinals.

[ButterflyLady29]

I had a House Wren family living in a birdhouse in my front yard last year. The male kept fighting and singing with his reflection in my living room window. We had to keep the curtain closed so he would spend time raising his family. There were 2 broods that fledged from that little house. I was able to video record the last day the parents spent feeding their last brood of the year. It was a constant back and forth that day with both parents feeding babies.

[digitS']

. . . we could do with a lesser number of grackles ... Meadowlarks are beginning to show up in the field, and we are eagerly awaiting the Kingbirds. ...]

I have not seen a meadowlark here for years and years! It's probably been well over 10 and maybe closer to 20 years since they were here keeping the killdeer, cows and cowboys entertained.

I could be wrong but I blame the meadowlark's distant cousin, the starling. The first starlings I saw was when I was about 12 or 15, in southern Oregon. We said that they migrated north out of California.

Starlings were here when I migrated north nearly 50 years ago so if they put pressure on the more solitary meadowlark, it began about then. It is probably true that this was the northern part of the meadowlarks' range and they decided showing up to build nests wasn't worth coming here. Disappointing ...

If meadowlarks can live with grackles, count your blessings .

Steve

[tomf]

I like most of them, crows not so much. A short list of some of the cooler birds that come by are; Eagles, Turkey Vultures, Pileated Woodpeckers, Grouse, Quail, Hawks, Owls, and Sapsuckers. We are feeding the birds so every day there are tons of small birds out our windows.

[tomf]

Morning doves make the nices sounds.

[DavidCampbell]

I believe I saw a robin today. It showed up in a walnut tree across the road.

The robin was there about the first of December . For all I know, it's the same bird. Sitting down here at home, the 3 most common places to find me all have a view of that tree. The chairs and 3 windows all line up right.

I could claim that a robin has sat in that tree once every 6 weeks since October. Ha! Might be true. I think that there are very few over-wintering and I've seen them no where else. It is a blue-sky, snow-covered landscape day! Yesterday, overcast, and even without snow or rain that day, the streetlights were still on at 10:15 AM! ... If I had wings ... !

Ah well, the robins will all be back by spring.

Steve

I like magpies but having seen this video I want my own robin https://www.instagram.com/p/BAz_xFBg7CJ/

[digitS']

David, someone else will have to verify that as a Robin of the British Isles!

Holland Park is in London, just past Kensington gardens and Paddington station.

The British have their larks! And, other critters, as well.

Steve

[applestar]

Today's favorite is Titmouse. I heard a rustling, then rapid tapping right outside a FR window and there was a cute beady eyed and nervous titmouse cracking open some seed on the grapevine.

[Taiji]

The talk of meadowlarks reminded me of the Scott's oriole, which also has such a distinctive melodic song that sounds so much like a meadowlark. We have the meadowlarks around this area out on the prairies. I live at a little higher elevation in the foothills and sometimes Scott's orioles pass through. They don't come very often, but when I hear their beautiful song I rush outside to see. They usually perch on the tops of the pinion pines.

[Taiji]

Speaking of titmice, I love to watch them work the birdfeeders! I have seed that has some sunflower seeds in there, and they scoop out seeds by the dozens, til they get to a sunflower seed, then fly off to a high branch and somehow pick at it til they get to the seed inside. They are such an industrious bird, they just work constantly, minding their own business! I often think if we humans were like that we'd be a lot better off!

I don't mind the seeds they discard to the ground since the juncos and jays scoop them up.

[A Happy Seedling]

Today's favorite is Titmouse. I heard a rustling, then rapid tapping right outside a FR window and there was a cute beady eyed and nervous titmouse cracking open some seed on the grapevine.

Lol, I can't get rid of mine! I like them, though. They are regular feeder lovers, and I'm glad they prevent the ravenous juncos from eating everything in my feeder (and if they got hungry enough, the feeder too ). They restrict the juncos to eating the seed on the ground that is discarded by the picky wrens, alongside the squirrels, doves, sometimes cardinals, and sparrows that scavenge the ground for seed.

Our birds are messed up .
White-Breasted Nuthatches are clinging birds, and lately they have been PERCHING on the feeder (before, they just clung to the mesh upside down) and WALKING on the GROUND to eat the discarded seeds. I didn't even know they could do that.
Clinging woodpeckers have been doing the same.
Chickadees are clinging...
And doves are attempting to walk up trees because they saw the Pileated Woodpeckers do it.
Doves are so stupid
I wish I had my camera when they were falling flat on their backs.

[webmaster]

I wish I had my camera when they were falling flat on their backs.

That made me LOL.

[A Happy Seedling]

LOL
The stupid things just kept trying...
It was a sight

[Taiji]

I wish I had my camera when they were falling flat on their backs.

That made me LOL.

Next thing you know they'll be trying to fly or something.

[A Happy Seedling]

Never seen these ones fly...
They're too fat.
Sumo doves?
O.O

[Gary350]

Birds are my best friends they eat all the bugs in my garden. I never spray for bugs. I have 25 bird houses. I like wrens best they sing none stop all day and eat 2 times their body weight in bugs every day. I build special bird houses for my wrens.

[A Happy Seedling]

Birds are my best friends they eat all the bugs in my garden. I never spray for bugs. I have 25 bird houses. I like wrens best they sing none stop all day and eat 2 times their body weight in bugs every day. I build special bird houses for my wrens.

Adorable!

[HoneyBerry]

A male house wren builds a dozen nests in the Spring and then shows off his handy work to the female. The female chooses the nest. Often the female tears apart the nest and then builds a new nest. Persnickity, those little female wrens.

[j3707]

Right now my favorite are the Robins - they just came back for spring! I can hear them all over in the early morning.

[imafan26]

I saw a cattle egret poking around my front yard looking for bugs or maybe a lizard.
https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Cattle_Egret/id

[catgrass]

I counted about 23 cardinals at my feeders yesterday evening. A few blackbirds and some "tweety birds". The cat was mesmerized!

[A Happy Seedling]

23?! Our cardinals come in pairs. Right now we have 2 pairs of mates living on our property somewhere in the bushes behind our house, and 1 pair that visits sometimes and lives in the woods.

[applestar]

Yep, same here, until they have their babies. -- then it's usually the babies, the male, and the female, too... Though I think it's the male that is more diligent and continue to feed them until fledging. Sometimes, after that, I see the siblings staying together for a while.

They usually have at least two broods, maybe three? during the season and are CONSTANTLY looking for baby food (worms and bugs) in the garden.