Juvenile Green Heron

Today I released two rehabilitated juvenile Green Herons that had been raised in the WRC Avian Nursery. They flew to a tree on an island and eyeballed the people who had gathered to watch the release. Very nice of them. So many people go their entire lives without seeing these small, somewhat elusive herons. Live well young herons!

Yellow Warblers at the Cabin

Just a quick post before I hit the road, returning to the Twin Cities after a fun-filled weekend with friends and family.

I was thrilled to find more than four different pairs of Yellow Warblers flitting through the birch, oak and pine trees at the cabin. Looked as if there were several fledglings with them as well. Very fun to see!

Hope you're all having a great summer and enjoying the nature that surrounds you.

Juvenile House Wren Study

Who doesn't love baby birds? They're amazingly cute and very, very hungry.

Right off our stoop is a nest of House Wrens. They've been growing louder and louder for the past two weeks and started poking their heads out a few days ago. I've been hoping to get photos and today they obliged.

The parent wrens, who must be absolutely exhausted by now, are attempting to lure the baby wrens out of the house by moving farther and farther away while holding food.

The baby wrens beg and beg until the parent wren capitulates and comes to the perch to feed them.

Hopefully I'll be around when they fledge. Wishing you a wonderful baby bird season!

Snowy Cardinal

I was amazed at the colors in this when I saw it onscreen. You know how you snap a photo, think "oh, this might be good" but really don't know until you open it up? I had no idea it captured the "glowing" aspect of the cardinal - was so excited when I saw this. No filters, no nothing, just sheer luck.

I took this in the evening during a heavy snow a couple weeks ago. The cardinals were sheltering in our large white pine that's just yards from a feeding station. The branch this one is sitting on sticks out farther than the rest, so it gave a nice brightness in the forefront with the background being in shadow. You can almost feel the silent denseness of the fresh snow in it.

Hope all of you have at least one "wow" moment this snowy winter (even those of you battling the snow down south!).

Not Your Usual Yard Birds

I always love migration. You just never know what's going to pop up in the yard. First, I should say that "yard" for us means roughly a half acre of grass, the rest is one acre of in-process prairie restoration and 3.5 acres of mixed hardwoods and pines. It makes for fabulous bird watching.

We had two visitors this week within 15 minutes of each other that had me running for my camera.

When I caught a glimpse of the first bird my initial thought was "Curve-billed Thrasher??? WHAT?" Trust me, there's a good explanation for why I'd pop a bird from the American Southwest into Minnesota. We've raised one in our Avian Nursery at WRC. Yep. It caught a ride on a trailer hitch for nearly 600 miles before the people found it. It's hopping a ride back to Arizona tomorrow so it's been on my mind lately. But that's a whole different story... the point of this is that the curved bill is what caught my attention through the apple tree:

Turns out it's a juvenile Yellow-billed Cuckoo. (not a Curve-billed Thrasher... go figure!)

The second cool bird was this Blue-headed Vireo:

From a front view you can get a better look at its signature "spectacles:"

While Blue-headed Vireos nest up north in the Arrowhead region of Minnesota, the Yellow-billed Cuckoos nest in my area. But I've never seen one in our yard before.

You can tell it's a juvenile by its bright yellow orbital ring. The ring will begin greying next spring. Here's a closer look at its eye:

Note the cuckoo is actually panting. We've had an extremely hot run of weather and are in the middle of drought. Both birds came down to bird baths that we have in our yard. Water is an equally important draw as bird feeders. Without water I probably never would've had these birds come so close to the house.

While the cuckoo has a long migration ahead of it (all the way down to South America) the vireo will actually stay in North and Central America for the winter.

Both birds glean insects from tree branches. A great reason to keep a pesticide-free habitat!


Check out other neat migration birds and photos from all over the world via Wild Bird Wednesday.

Flamenco: Cooper's Style

Every year we have Cooper's Hawks nest in our east pine trees. And every year they mercilessly pick off our birds at the bird feeders.

A juvenile has been hanging out in the yard  for nearly a month and the other day I took the opportunity to spend time photographing it.

What did I learn from this? Apparently Cooper Hawks know how to do the Flamenco. Or at least this one does.

A little stretching first:

Limber up that neck:

Warm up those legs:

Flamenco Right!

and Flamenco Left!

Crouch down

and full leg extension!

 And a final, humble bow:

Thank you. Thank you very much.

Head over to Stewart's page for Wild Bird Wednesday to enjoy other fun and beautiful bird posts. (and feel free to kick up your heels on the way over...)

A Little of This, A Little of That

I've been up at the family cabin outside of Nisswa, Minn., for the last few days trying to escape the sweltering temps and humidity.

While here I've been doing quite a bit of this:

which inevitably leads to this...

orange bluet (male)

and then more of this:

white-faced meadowhawk (male)

and even some of this:

preening black and white warbler (female)

Hope you're enjoying the last few weeks of summer as well!

Be sure to check out all the other fun posts for Our World Tuesday.

A Curious, and Hungry, Chestnut-sided Warbler

Our spring in Minnesota has been brutal for insectivores. Dozens of Eastern Bluebirds and Tree Swallows have been found dead in nestboxes, having starved (or frozen?) to death during our cold, wet spring. Phoebes, which showed up more than a month ago, have been completely absent since our late snows and freezing temps. It's hard to survive when your primary food source isn't available.

In the last two weeks there have been days on end of "warbler fallouts" where they're basically littering the ground, searching for any morsel to eat. And any hint of sunshine brings the warblers out in full force, hunting for any bugs they can find. While it makes for great birding, it's sad to know that it's because they're struggling to survive.

On Sunday, we had this very curious Chestnut-sided Warbler follow us through the gardens. Can you ask for a more beautiful bird to stalk you? I think not.

He started flitting down to us as we were poking around in the wood chips searching for signs of emerging ferns and lupines. I imagine we were uncovering tasty morsels for him.

From there, he followed us to our "East Garden." As Dean looked over the plants that have emerged in that bed, the warbler flitted down right next to his feet and hopped from the garden up to a rock and back down again. It was amazing to have this gorgeous bird so close for so long.

It's been here for several days now, enjoying suet with the dozens of Yellow-rumpeds. As a special treat I picked up 1,000 mealworms on Monday for everyone. They were gone in a matter of hours much to the delight of the birds (and me who enjoyed watching them eagerly slurp them down like spaghetti noodles).

I included this photo because it shows the beautiful markings on the Chestnut-sided's back. I never realized how much yellow they have on their backs until this weekend:

After all our cold weather (there was frost on Sunday night) we hit a whopping 96 degrees today. Many of the warblers in our yard took advantage of the warm weather and moved on. I didn't see the Chestnut-sided at all today and there are only a couple dozen Yellow-rumpeds still hanging around.

Can't wait to see what the warm weather and high winds blows in overnight! Stay tuned...


Posted in conjunction with other bird aficionados through Wild Bird Wednesday. Be sure to check them all out!

Ruddy Turnstones on The Cape

Thought I'd share some more photos from our East Coast trip this past fall as part of Wild Bird Wednesday. One of the birds that we saw daily on the beach at our Cape Cod rental was the Ruddy Turnstone. There was a small flock of a dozen birds that combed the beach and the rocky breakwall throughout the day.

They were in their non-breeding plumage, which is a soft mottled brownish grey. I love how soft they look and the contrast with their bright orange legs.

The color patterns on their backs are beautiful and when in flock they make a stunning image. Well, they do if you can capture the image (goal for 2013: practice inflight photography!). There's a lovely photo on this blog, 6th image down.

As coastal birds, Ruddy Turnstones nest FAR into the Arctic Circle and migrate along the coasts down to their wintering grounds in California, Central America, the Caribbean and South America.

And, they live up to their name. Constantly flipping rocks, shells and seaweed clumps to find tasty morsels:

While this image isn't the best quality due to the light angle, it's one of my favorite images from the Cape Cod portion of our trip. I snapped it one evening while sitting on the breakwall. The turnstone was curious and stayed in that spot for quite awhile studying me. I love the sparkly quality of the photo and whenever I look at it I can smell the briny sea air...

(be sure to check out all the other great posts for WBW!)

Abert's Towhee in Arizona

While not a "little" brown bird, the Abert's Towhee is still a non-descript brown bird. I came across several during my morning walks in Arizona a few weeks ago.

At first glance I thought maybe they were female cardinals but the coloring was off (note the somewhat hard to see black face). The tail also seemed a bit long (compared to a cardinal's) and they didn't have crests. Glad I snapped photos of them, it helped me ID them.

And, I must say I think that's one of the greatest things about digital cameras. You can snap photos of something to examine more closely later without worrying about the cost of film, bad exposure, etc.

Back to these interesting birds...Abert's Towhees are primarily found in a very small geographic range in the Sonoran Desert in Arizona. In fact, it has the smallest distribution of any bird in America! Small populations can also be found in southwestern Utah and in parts of southern California and the Baja Peninsula.

The bird's population has battled with loss of habitat but several citings listed them as beginning to colonize in the Phoenix suburbs, which is exactly where I found these six birds: North Scottsdale on a small, private golf course.

Like other towhees, they tend to scratch around on the ground stirring up insects - their primary diet:

The Abert's Towhee is non-migratory and stays on its territory with its mate all year round. Nesting begins in late March and they raise two broods during the season.

You know what a group of towhees is called? A "Tangle" or "Teapot!"

Visiting with a Cardinal

A curious male Northern Cardinal checked me out earlier today. This image makes me laugh:

Windblown Tree Sparrow

It was a bit windy the other day at the cabin...

Juvenile E. Kingbird Hovering

Eastern Kingbirds catch their food on the wing and often hover while chasing prey and to glean bugs. Last August, this juvenile kingbird was doing a fairly good job of capturing insects. It would hover, dip into the tall grass, soar around, hover and dip back down into the grass. After watching it for awhile I think it was doing a combination of scaring up bugs to catch, by going into the grass, as well as gleaning bugs off the vegetation.

First Snow of Season

I awoke this morning to fluffy white flakes drifting by my bedroom window. Overall, maybe 1-2" of snow cover on the ground. Just enough to make it pretty outside.

Took a break from work this afternoon to enjoy the birds in snow. We have a couple White-throated Sparrows still hanging around. This one was tucked back in one of our brush piles  - could just barely see it through all the tall grass.

Juncos are plentiful and this one was munching away on seed heads from a wild aster right outside our living room window:

Throughout our acreage we leave several brush piles for the birds to use. They provide cover and roosting spots for the birds and are always busy places:

This junco has quite a bit of reddish brown on it. I got a better look while it took the time to scratch and preen:

So glad snow is here!

Juvenile Hairy Claims Suet Log

 
It's been fun to watch the Donwys and Hairys learn to use our suet logs. They've been coming to the feeders for about 8 days now and in the last couple they've started to defend their territory on the feeders.

Wonder what switch gets thrown in their heads to go from all piling onto the suet log together to defending it against any other bird that comes to it, including this innocent White-breasted nuthatch.

 

(the nuthatch flew off before the Hairy had to spread its wings)

Blue Jay Fledgling

A young, disgruntled looking Blue Jay was hopping around the cabin's property last weekend. Every time someone walked by or its parents flew over, it'd open its mouth wide open begging for food (and increasing its funny, curmudgeonly look).

Being on the ground is typical for fledgling birds; many of whom leave the nest before they can fly. Blue Jays, cardinals, robins are some of the most common species to do this.

Note that the fledgling is just developing its flight feathers and tail feathers. They simply do not have room to do this packed into a nest with other brood members. So, they flop out of the nest around day 14 and spend 6-8 days on the ground learning to look for food, how to evade predators and practicing short flights. The whole time the parents will be around, feeding and protecting them.

In about six days this little guy should be flying, harrassing its parents at our feeders!

Is it Winter? A Leucistic Goldfinch

For the past month, every time I look out the window and see a goldfinch I think to myself: "Wow! He's super yellow. Wonder why..."  Duh. It's summer.

My slowness on the change of seasonal molt is due to the fact that one of our most active goldfinches is a very pale male. He still looks like he's in his winter colors, which has lead my slow mind to be surprised whenever I see our normal, brightly-colored finches. We noticed him for the first time in late February, when the other male finches were starting to get their yellow patches.

The finch is leucistic meaning that its regular pigmentation is washed out. Sometimes this happens in splotches, sometimes it's an overall wash. In this bird's case it's an overall wash of his yellow feathers (with some whiter areas) - the black feathers are normally pigmented.

The funny thing is, the nape of its neck is dark. You would expect it to be the same washed-out yellow:

Even though goldfinches have two molts a year, his feathers will not improve with a molt as leucism is a genetic mutation.


Add'l Reading: Cornell's Lab of Ornithology has a great article explaining the differences between albinism and leucism. 

Hummingbirds!

Wow. What timing. I've been incredibly busy and have neglected spring preparations. Saw posts today on MNBird Listserve and on Twitter about hummingbirds moving and thought to myself "oh oh. Better do it while I have the time."

So glad I made nectar and hung a couple of our favorite feeders this morning before heading out to meetings: We just had a couple male Ruby-throateds at our favorite window feeders (these photos are of the same bird).

Thank you network, for keeping me on my toes! (and keeping our hummingbirds happy and fed)