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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
12-19-2017, 10:04 AM
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the mice and juncos are contending over grain spillage near this rotting tie wall
real fights...totally unexpected considering the difference in sizes
my desire for a shot was interrupted by a cooper's that actually dragged a mouse from the wall a couple of days ago
no visible rodents since
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
11-10-2017, 03:43 AM
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finches are a constant for us...three or four goldfinches and a couple dozen house finches yesterday
redpolls get the real birders aroused...according to reports they are thinning out already
as always a very nice image!
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
11-09-2017, 01:22 PM
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we're pretty excited
pine siskins are supposed to be common here but in forty plus years we've never had one in the yard...today we've got five coming and going
this was grabbed through a bedroom window
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
11-01-2017, 08:13 AM
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bumped the window with the lens hood
it was hunting mice in the garden
if cooper's were dogs they would be some kind of terrier...relentless
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
10-09-2017, 02:55 PM
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a little downy at the 4pm rush
I don't know how it works at yours but our yard operates on a two hour cycle
there will be birds out of sync but generally once the first appearance is noted you can set your watch to the subsequent arrivals
at four it got noisy and today is almost thirty degrees cooler than yesterday, so....
150 (I quit counting after that) robins in the two elms next door, another 75-100 in the mulberry south
at least 100 house sparrows in the vines we planted to obscure our doper neighbor's lifestyle
this will be the last big feed of the day
though they will bathe in the stream until dark, especially the robins and cardinals
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
09-29-2017, 12:29 PM
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this is a first here
our humming visitors never, ever share
we have four feeding stations for hummers...three with significant separation...yet here are two hummers in close proximity
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
09-28-2017, 03:00 PM
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a catbird
usually gone from here a month ago
a brown thrasher is sneaking about as well
sometimes, other than the meowing, their calls can be confused
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
09-15-2017, 03:15 PM
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down a dirt road and in someone else's back yard
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
08-30-2017, 11:39 AM
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surprisingly another batch of kids...orioles, house sparrows, house finches, blue jays, starlings, grackles and robins...showed up today
this cowbird is parented by a crew of house sparrows
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
08-29-2017, 07:33 AM
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a couple cool evenings and the migrants and their hunters are passing through
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
08-10-2017, 01:09 PM
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in case you've wondered why they are called yellow-shafted flickers
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
08-09-2017, 07:00 AM
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even though there is an awful lot of dove sex it seems as though the other birds have enough young
a couple of dozen house sparrows
easily three dozen house finches
at least three cardinals
two mourning doves
at least two goldfinches
single catbird, oriole, downy woodpecker and cowbird juveniles
and a couple late robins
the starlings and grackles all look like adults now and i'm sure are waiting to bunch up, then eat us out of house and home in a couple weeks
a pair of wrens that live just north of us have young and yesterday an adult was trying one our nest boxes on for size
it has been quite a summer
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
08-08-2017, 03:00 PM
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I realize folks get exercised over "trash" birds
my take is they are just birds...no more no less
this is a starling according to his parents and siblings...you know that it is really a brown headed cowbird
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
08-06-2017, 07:07 AM
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I could hear but not see the altercation
this wren ended up hiding in the flower pot for quite a while
now we know!
we have a young cooper's hawk hunting the neighborhood
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
08-03-2017, 12:13 PM
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on one of my seemingly endless trips to the coffee pot
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
07-03-2017, 04:17 AM
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we keep very rudimentary records of our backyard birds
it gives us a calendar of expectations, I suppose
we know mid-june the orioles will have their young and disappear
the catbirds will wake us up but hold tight in the brush along the fence line
early july will see the arrival of (for us) very rare house wrens
they will use the stream for a week or two, then move on
we were excited to catch this guy
through the window and in the rain
not a particularly good shot but a record of a welcome guest
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
06-18-2017, 02:12 PM
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we didn't have to wait as long as we'd imagined
dad dropped this one off at the stream for a bath and some bullying from a brood of robins
while he ate jelly unaffected by territorial imperatives
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
06-17-2017, 08:07 PM
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every body has kids this week...now if I can get a shot of our first oriole family
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
05-25-2017, 06:43 AM
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we have a lot of young birds
the yammering stopped, so I grabbed my camera
these guys were looking south but I couldn't see what they saw
I missed the shot but a cooper's hawk came low, swooped up and grabbed a starling chick
I feel bad for the bird but the relative silence is quite refreshing
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
05-12-2017, 06:38 AM
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we've lived here for about forty years
actively fed wildlife for thirty+
when we built a pond and ten or so feet of stream it changed everything
our yard turned into a kind of demilitarized zone for everybody except the neighbors' cats and the hawks who consider it a smorgasbord
the reason for the story is this robin
it is building a nest in the corner of our yard...a first
just across the fence a pair of orioles are using fibers from one of our hanging planters to start a nest in a mulberry thicket
close to a family of house finches who brought their FOY young to the feeders yesterday
I don't know if it is a maturation of a habitat or something else but it is changing the interaction of the birds here
much more territoriality...much less give and take
it should be interesting
while I was typing this an oriole stopped by for more building materials
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
05-11-2017, 04:35 PM
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we have a half dozen orioles and a couple of catbirds eating the oranges on a regular basis
finches occasionally
so one full day
keep in mind we have two regular oriole feeders (jelly and fruit) up as well
catbirds, robins and orioles (plus a soon-to-be diabetic squirrel) eat the jelly first
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
05-11-2017, 04:05 PM
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it is our first year using this feeder
just four tines to hold fruit...like a grappling hook
using oranges the opossums, catbirds and orioles seem quite happy with it
the shot is from quite a distance but you should get the idea
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
05-01-2017, 11:15 AM
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I am quite envious
our yellow warblers never hang around long enough to get bright
we have to wade through the ticks streamside a couple of weeks from now to get a nice colorful shots like those
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
04-30-2017, 05:59 AM
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the search for the perfect peanut continues....
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Forum: Mini-Challenges, Games, and Photo Stories
04-27-2017, 06:06 AM
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contrary to our extended family's reckoning, we aren't birders
however in the early almost nighttime skies we had sixteen species stop by in about as many minutes
this harris sparrow is my wife's favorite but we usually only get them one or two days a year
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