Awesome owl picture!
How did you know it was a female owl?
Thanks!
j
Awesome owl picture!
Moby DuckSandtrap wrote: ↑Sat Feb 13, 2021 7:06 amHuge monster bird did a fly by of our house and cruised down to a distant tree line. Sat on the top of a large tree. Looked as big as a silver steel trash can in the sunlight. I have never seen a bird that big. Have no idea what it was. We have "great heron's" but it seemed bigger, thicker. Dunno?
Makes a sounds like a wild wail?livesoft wrote: ↑Sat Feb 13, 2021 7:08 amMoby DuckSandtrap wrote: ↑Sat Feb 13, 2021 7:06 amHuge monster bird did a fly by of our house and cruised down to a distant tree line. Sat on the top of a large tree. Looked as big as a silver steel trash can in the sunlight. I have never seen a bird that big. Have no idea what it was. We have "great heron's" but it seemed bigger, thicker. Dunno?
Was stationed at an AF base with a large prairie dog population, which also liked to run out in front of vehicles. Your comment reminded me of a joke told on base.vested1 wrote: ↑Sat Feb 13, 2021 5:16 am Great pictures in this thread, thanks. The last couple of days we've had a flock of about 30 Guinea Fowl congregating at a fairly busy intersection in a 55 mph zone about a mile from our house. I'm surprised there haven't been a number of avian casualties as these birds tend to run out in the road when they see a car coming. We have a few bird feeders in the backyard, and see cardinals, blue birds, woodpeckers, and song birds including a variety of finches.
The picture is one that I pulled off of the web. We've lived on our property for nearly 28 years and this only the second time we've heard Great Horned Owls. Never have seen one, though. We hear (and, occasionally see) barred Owls all of the time. But, having Great Horned on our property is rare.
Lately we've been gifted with a daily deposit of Canadian geese diarrhea on the 60' gangplank to our dock. If I don't wash it off within a couple of days it turns into concrete, requiring a scrubbing on hands and knees. This picture looks like the life sized plastic owl with a head that rotates in the wind that I just mounted on the rail of the gangplank. That deterrent lasted for one day.
That is one of the parents.
Hope you don't have a lot of holly bushes loaded with berries. Those cedar waxwings will eat the berries and crap all over. The dropping are like glue. So don't leave your auto outside. They will move on as soon as the berries are gone.
We have had an unusual number of redwings at the feeder this winter. Usually they flock further south but warmer winter has more of them around. Have not come up with a solution. I stopped putting out suet and have adjusted our feeder so that it closes when a bird that big sits on the rail. Cut out the cardinals though. We've had quite a few purple finches and pine siskins back in the area so trying to give them first dibs on the seed.
Thanks for the fun story and feeding the birds! I've never been able to feed one from my hand (yet). So fun to watch.BrightEyes wrote: ↑Wed Feb 17, 2021 10:48 pm I've suddenly got lots of redwing blackbirds, too, probably due to the snow in Middle Tennessee. i usually don't see them much. They have been congregating in the back yard trees, as well as visiting the deck and feeders. I've been putting corn and seeds on the deck for the groundfeeders the past couple days, as well as refilling the feeders.
Yesterday, the pair of tiny red-breasted nuthatches that have been wintering here came and chittered at me as I refilled the tubes with sunflower seeds. They will eat at the peanut feeder, but I think they preferred to whole loose Spanish peanuts* I'd been putting out on the deck rails, as they could just take them 'to-go". (Proper Covid dining?!) Anyhow, they were scolding me for the lack of loose nuts, I think, so I put a few on my gloved palm and stood very still-- and the bold little female lighted quickly on my fingertips and grabbed herself a peanut before flying away with it. Today, she dared it again, but dropped the nut, so she came right back for a replacement! Then returned for two more after hiding that one. It was only about 18 degrees out, so I didn't last much longer being so still, but it was so neat to be so close to these amazing little creatures, and to see her boldness! And since I was still, the tufted titmouse came to the tube feeder a few times while I was standing there, but the upgrade from sunflower seed to peanut was not sufficient reward for him to light on my hand!
We're going through the current 50 lb bag of sunflower seeds very quickly, with so many more mouths to feed, and I'm about to achieve my goal of emptying the galvanized can the corn's been stored in, so I can see how we like feeding hulled sunflower seed. But with now even more snow on the ground, and such deep cold for this locale, there are a lot more birds needing support, and my cats and I sure enjoy watching them gather on the deck and in the yard. I counted about 60 of the redwing blackbirds in one tree yesterday. And upwards of 25 on the deck at another point, gobbling the corn I had spread there. Plus I have seen over 30 goldfinches between deck and feeders, not even counting the ones in the yard below. More starlings and brown headed cowbirds the last few days, too. Not my favorites, as they are greedy and have poor manners toward the littler birds, but everyone is hungry right now, and my establishment seems to be one of the few places "open" right now. We still have the usual house finches, a few purple finches, the cardinals and Carolina wrens, Carolina chickadees, downy and red-bellied woodpeckers , blue jays, and sole mocking bird. Oh, and one tiny yellow breasted fellow I initially thought was one of the hoard of goldfinches just didn't quite look right, his beak seemed awfully long and pointy for a finch... so I grabbed the field glasses and bird books, and discovered I had a pine warbler visiting the peanut feeder.
Lady Geek, thanks for your post a few days ago letting me know how to add pictures-- if I ever get any that are actually worth posting, I will follow the directions, but the ones I had were just not high-enough quality.
* Fun Boglehead frugality: I got a LOT of 1 lb bags of raw Spanish peanuts in Kroger's produce department when they put them on after-Christmas clearance for $1/bag-- that's about half what they sell for as bird food!
Bright Eyes
Jealous! No cheery Cardinals in my state (except for an occasional "stray" that sneaks in....)
Glad you like the thread!HomeStretch wrote: ↑Thu Feb 18, 2021 11:02 am This thread has been enjoyable to follow (thanks JAZZISCOOL!).
Any advice from the experts here on bird feeders and types of feed for a newbie?
I have lot of trees/gardens and several feeders with regular ruby-throated hummingbird visitors last year. In warmer weather, I regularly see hawks, blue jays, robins, cardinals, goldfinches, song sparrows, chickadees and last year Baltimore orioles. Due to squirrels and inexperience, I didn’t have much luck a few years ago with bird feeders but want to give it a try again.
We had a GHO that had built a nest high up in a white pine behind the house. Big, big nest. Was hooting all the time. Then about 6 weeks ago I heard this racket of screaming birds and went outside to see what it was out about. There were at least a dozen crows, maybe even 20, screaming & flapping wings like mad all around the owl nest from the pine trees. I seemed to disrupt what was going on & the owl took off with the pack of crows in pursuit. Owl hasn't been back. I didn't realize it till I looked it up that owls eat crows and the crows' behavior I observed is a common tactic crows use to get rid of GHOs.
GHOs will eat almost anything. Ruthless killers - they can take a porcupine. Birds do gang up and drive them off. We've had blackbirds gang up on them - even fly in and hit them to unseat them on the roost. They still nest around the adjacent woods - at least one pair but I've heard more than two before.
Great, thanks! Will check this out! Didn't see it before.....LadyGeek wrote: ↑Thu Feb 18, 2021 12:38 pm We have an on-going thread: Squirrel proof bird feeder
- My design is in this post: Re: Squirrel Proofing a Bird Feeder
AFLAC?RetiredAL wrote: ↑Wed Feb 17, 2021 6:48 pm Many of the bird types around the lake are City dwellers - very used to people. Having just got our "puppy shots", we had lunch in the park two weeks ago. This White Duck very gently pulls on your pant leg to remind you he's there. That is DW's leg. We don't feed them, except the fry DW dropped. Outside of the picture are another 6 or 7 ducks a various types, lots of Couts, some Geese, and a Sea Gull.
Looks like a Cooper's Hawk
Yes; it is a Coop; comes through from time to time. We have a Sharpie come through every once in a while. Smaller, more compact. Same effect on the neighborhood. Everyone scatters.
Cool! I look at a few once in a while. Here is a fun hummingbird site I like since it's cold here (SoCal):Thranduil wrote: ↑Fri Feb 19, 2021 8:05 am Just curious if anyone else watches birds on YouTube. I have been watching this live bird feeder cam in Ohio. Love seeing so many different birds that we do not have here in Northern Cal.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtGUTs_HgcE
(I have no affiliation with this YT channel....just a viewer)
wait a second, Crows are NOT SAINTS !!!! they go in and rob nestlings all then time !jebmke wrote: ↑Thu Feb 18, 2021 2:43 pmGHOs will eat almost anything. Ruthless killers - they can take a porcupine. Birds do gang up and drive them off. We've had blackbirds gang up on them - even fly in and hit them to unseat them on the roost. They still nest around the adjacent woods - at least one pair but I've heard more than two before.
They mostly migrate south (like to North Carolina and further south) but a few hang around. In Cape May, in the fall, you could see thousands at a time as they migrate. Most stop in Cape May when they get to the Delaware Bay and hang out for a few days eating, then cross the bay. Mostly, they eat ants, so you'll see them on the ground a lot too.
I don't know for sure but it seems when it is REALLY cold, that both birds and squirrels are less active and are probably trying to stay warm. That's just a guess. Maybe others have ideas or info. Also, if there are predators around, birds will hide but sounds weather related in your case.JPH wrote: ↑Sat Feb 20, 2021 1:16 pm I'm in South Texas and almost every day normally see many species of birds at my feeders. I noticed with the recent rare snowfall here that many of them have been avoiding the feeders. I put some seed on paper plates to accommodate the sparrows and white winged doves and others that feed off the ground. But none would take the seed. I've seen only an occasional ruby crowned kinglet and a few warblers on the suet. Now that the snow is melted I have a large pile of exposed seed on my patio and they still are not interested. Can anyone offer an explanation? Several squirrels are similarly avoiding my feeders.