Day 148: May 27th – Backyard Birds

Sunny! Warm (80), and calm

       It’s one of the nicest days we’ve had in some time.  It’s also the end of May, which means parties, baseball tourneys, yard work, etc.  In other words, not a lot of free time to go birding.  But, bird we must in order to keep the blog of the “Image of the day” going.  Where do you go when you have basically no time available?   The Back Yard!  I keep at least some of my feeders filled year-round and it is always interesting to see what species are attracted to the free meal during these warmer spring and summer months.

       There are some usual visitors which we expect to see every day…. House sparrows, Tufted titmice…….

.....Northern cardinals, Downey woodpeckers, American robins searching the grass and soil for those delicious worms, Mourning doves picking up all the seed scattered from the feeders by those less than tidy birds…….

and this year, many more House finches than usual.  Today, it was predominantly the females with their dusky blurry streaks on a white breast and belly and a finely streaked brown head.  

The males are much more spectacular, especially at this time of year, with reddish-orange to deep red  on their head, breast and rump. (See image below of a male I photographed earlier this month) 

Male, taken earlier this month

       Sadly, I had no males at the feeder while my camera lens was trained on the feeder.  As I watch the feeder birds each morning and evening, I’m glad that I persist in maintaining them with fresh seed and nectar.  I’m sure that there will be plenty more reports on the backyard birds as we go into summer with the warblers making their move out of the valley and other birds receding into the forest to make their nests and rear their young.

 

       Tomorrow, the plan is to head over to Sterling Forest State Park where a relatively rare (for this region) Mississippi kite has been spotted over the past two days.  Wish us luck!