Look! A bird!

[Langue_doc]

I had a good look at sparrows when they gathered around me to prospect for crumbs as I was eating a snack. I looked up their identities after I got home (I didn't have a camera with me). One of the group, very attractive, was a male house sparrow just taking on its breeding plumage. The others were, I think, non-breeding/immature males, but I didn't think to check the bill color. Sparrows are so omnipresent where I live (and zip about so rapidly) that it never occurred to me to try and distinguish among them before.

Depending on where you live, some of these could be song sparrows or even their white-throated counterparts.

Saw a whole bunch of Eastern Wood-Peewees yesterday, flying to and from the tops of branches of trees along a body of water. The belted kingfisher was back, sitting on the edge of one of the bodies of water, on which were a pair of American black ducks.

[FishProf]

I visited the Vermont Institute of Natural Science while up for the eclipse.  Spectacular up-close views of rehab raptors.  And crows.  Which were taunting the owl in the enclosure next door.  Ya know, like crows do.

[Langue_doc]

After seeing the eclipse, I meandered down to the places where the waterfowl tend to hang out, and just as I got to the first spot, a great blue heron flew down, landed on a grassy incline no more than 10 feet away, and then made its way down to the path, and then to the shoreline about three more feet away. The sight of a human didn't faze him in the least. I then went to another body of water, and was directed to the two killdeer along the muddy shoreline by a fellow birder. A couple of days earlier, I saw an egret fly back and forth across the water where the heron landed. Another heron yesterday, in another pond.

[FishProf]

The streak of rain on Ornithology Lab day continues.

My students are starting to suspect that Birds Aren't Real.

[Langue_doc]

Went birding on a very windy morning--winds must have been between 40-50 mph throughout the walk. In addition to the newly arrived warblers--pine, palm, yellow-rumped, we saw several blue-gray gnatcatchers, easily spotted because of their blue color, a brown thrasher, a green heron, a couple of turkey vultures, a kestrel, a falcon, two ospreys circling over water, most likely looking for food when they were chased off by a red-tailed hawk, more red-tailed hawks, and several good views of a blue grosbeak. He didn't have intense blue coloring of adult males, but was beginning to take on the blue (according to the expert birders in the group).

[apl68]

The blue jays that hang around my backyard each spring are back.  They've been quite visible in recent days when I sit on the patio with a book.  Saturday they and other birds had good foraging in the yard after it was mowed.

One evening last week I saw a cat over by the fence that might have been scoping them out.  It moved on when the neighbors' dogs began barking.  I suspect that if the cat ever tried assaulting one of those jays, it would be sorry it tried.

[nebo113]

Hummer feeder out today!

[AmLitHist]

We have a mother robin on the nest she's built by our bedroom AC unit--right up against the plastic pull-out wing that fits the unit to the width of the window frame.  There was one egg earlier this week, when ALHS took a look while she was off the nest; I don't know if there are more by now.

I need to get our hummer feeders out this weekend. Also, the red wing blackbirds have been back for a couple of weeks already.

[Langue_doc]

Took a detour to a birding hotspot and was rewarded by a sight of more than 200 birds, either nesting or gathering nest materials--snowy egrets, great egrets, glossy ibises, white ibises, yellow-crowned night herons, black-crowned night herons, a couple of little herons, and great blue herons, but mostly egrets and ibises.

[Langue_doc]

Saturday's post seems to have disappeared, so am reposting a list of the birds I saw. Plenty of purple martins on the birdhouses built for them in the refuge--they were noisy!. One osprey carrying a fish, another sitting on a short pole along the shore munching on a rather large fish. Several more ospreys flying overhead, a turkey vulture, several foster's terns and swans, at least five swans sitting on nests. This was Saturday's count--left out the usual birds.

On Sunday I stopped at the birding hotspot to take another look at the birds. This refuge is on a fairly small strip of land between the ocean and an inlet, and the access to it on an overlook on a rather long bridge, so that the trees are at eye-level or lower. If you go down the steps you're just a path away from the refuge, which gives you a street-level view of the birds and their habitat. There were the usual snowy egrets, glossy ibises, on trees and also flying over in typical goose formation of more than 200 (probably more than 400 individuals in the same area), white ibises, a few yellow-crowned night herons, several black-crowned night herons, and what appeared to be a little blue heron. I stood at the overlook for quite some time, seeing the fights, the birds carrying nesting materials, mostly twigs, and the reason for some of the fights, birds alighting and taking off from their perches and nests, birds just milling around, and all of them just co-existing peacefully--I thought that this was DEI in actions. The highlight was seeing a glossy ibis alterate between standing and sitting on her nest, which contained two large eggs in a lovely Easter egg-green color.

[apl68]

Sounds like a wonderful time!  Congratulations on all the good observations.  And on being able to visit such a good refuge.  It sounds like a lovely place, in addition to all the bird life.

[AmLitHist]

Update:  FOUR eggs in the robin's nest!

[fleabite]

I had a good look at sparrows when they gathered around me to prospect for crumbs as I was eating a snack. I looked up their identities after I got home (I didn't have a camera with me). One of the group, very attractive, was a male house sparrow just taking on its breeding plumage. The others were, I think, non-breeding/immature males, but I didn't think to check the bill color. Sparrows are so omnipresent where I live (and zip about so rapidly) that it never occurred to me to try and distinguish among them before.

Depending on where you live, some of these could be song sparrows or even their white-throated counterparts.

Thanks for the reply, which I just saw. There are many of the tan-type of white-throated sparrow in my area, but what I saw were definitely house sparrows. They struck my eye because the markings were unfamiliar to me.

AmListHist: I hope all four eggs in the robin's nest hatch!

[AmLitHist]

There are four hungry little robins in the nest, and increasing numbers of hummers at the feeders!

[Langue_doc]

The Saturday bird walk was along the shoreline/marshy area where we saw assorted shorebirds--great egrets, snowy egrets, herons, glossy ibises, more than 50 ruddy ducks, other duck species, several migrant warblers, and ospreys, one of them sitting on the ususal nest. Just missed the red-headed woodpecker, which according the the birders standing there had just flown off the tree it's been haunting for about a week. I went again yesterday, and much to my surprise saw it a few trees away from its usual haunt. The coloring was exactly like that in the photo (see link above). After hopping up and down that tree trunk, the bird flew across the path and into the bushes on the other side. It was interesting to see that most everyone had either seen the bird or wanted to know if any of us had seen it. I directed one birder to the spot where I saw it and heard him tell another birder that I had seen the bird. Earlier in the week at another location, I came across a duck with 12 newly hatched ducklings.