OK, so birds

[thollandpe]

I found half a garter snake on the same walkway this morning.

OK, so birds.

Glad you brought it back around to birds. The most distinguishing characteristic of the garter snake to me, because as a kid I handled many a garter snake, is the pungent and persistent odor of their urine and how difficult it is to wash off. Maybe that's the part the bird left for you.

Also today, mid morning, barrel owl hoots in the woods. And a pterodactyl, er I mean a pileated woodpecker, hurried by.

[Tom]

So last fall when we were in Lake Placid Karen called me on having said we needed bird houses and urged me to buy a cute Adirondack style stick bird house with a cute birch bark roof and I grudgingly did. When we got home I hung it from the corner of the porch. Where it remained empty until this week when a house wren moved in. I've enjoyed meetings sitting on the phone looking out the window watching the little bird fly in and out. I read that they have a problem with mites in the nest which can kill the nestlings but if they find a spider egg sac somewhere while they are picking up nest material they'll grab it so that when the spiders hatch they eat the mites. Pretty neat.

And the damn geese. So this morning I'm riding along past the nature preserve and there's a gander in my lane standing there and I guess his mate bedded down in the other lane. Serenely sitting there looking at me as I pass. She seemed OK, just resting comfortably.

[thollandpe]

And the damn geese. So this morning I'm riding along past the nature preserve and there's a gander in my lane standing there and I guess his mate bedded down in the other lane. Serenely sitting there looking at me as I pass. She seemed OK, just resting comfortably.

Serene is good. Not always their disposition.

[vertical_doug]

Baby bald eagle getting close to fledging


https://hdontap.com/index.php/video/...eagle-live-cam

[j44ke]

Baby bald eagle getting close to fledging


https://hdontap.com/index.php/video/...eagle-live-cam

Big baby.

[open roader]

Back in late June 2017 we finished a 7 week long USA /Canada road trip at East Sooke on Vancouver Island.

Our harbour side cottage had a pair of Bald Eagles raising a fledgling in the trees in front of our sun deck.

The parents flew food in several times daily, day after day and on our very last day staying there I had the pleasure of photographing the fledgling take it's very first proper flight!

A big deal for us Australians.

Baby-Baldy-lift-off-Eliza-Point-June-26-email.jpg

[vertical_doug]

Big baby.

The baby is 10 weeks old... close to fledging. Baby is branching and flapping. Getting close....

[davids]

Thanks for that! You summoned memories of a kayak excursion in Ketchikan AK (while on a cruise up the Inside Passage) that featured a stop under a bald eagle's nest on a tiny island in the sound. The guide had been taking folks out there for days, knowing the fledgling was getting big. That's a parent, out on the bare branch:

20160802_100006.jpg

We got to see it take its first flight. So great.

[Tom]

So the house wrens finished the nest and a pair of house sparrows evicted them as soon as they were done. Male wren spent some time yelling from the yew tree and running sorties but the male sparrow was unmoved.

[echappist]

So the house wrens finished the nest and a pair of house sparrows evicted them as soon as they were done. Male wren spent some time yelling from the yew tree and running sorties but the male sparrow was unmoved.

Sorry to hear about the wrens.

Btw, I'm pretty sure you are allowed to destroy house sparrow nests (and those belonging to starlings).

If I were to see a house sparrow doing evictions on my property, I'd go buy a pellet gun and shoot the lil f***er.

[echappist]

So the good news in the new robin's nest is that one egg hatched.

The bad news is that there used to be four eggs up until a few days ago, when the number of eggs decreased to two. Pretty sure there's only one hatchling in the nest (although I might have mis-counted), which means that one more egg is gone. My guess is that the nest will be empty soon. Oh well; circle of life and all that...

[echappist]

And the nest failed. The parents were surprisingly absent when I checked on the nest today. Normally, either both parents would be perched on my roof or one (presumably the father) would be perched on the roof while the other would be on the nest. I thought their absence to be somewhat strange, given that it has been only one week since hatching, and my suspicion was confirmed when I went to check the content of the nest.

Poor robins, this is the second nest to have been predated upon. I thought I heard some commotion last night, but I didn't check if the nest was still occupied.

A photo from ~one week ago, back when the little one hatched. My guess is that it was ~at least five days from fledging.

[j44ke]

3 different wren families have taken over a wren box and two bluebird boxes. Tree swallows are in the other two bluebird boxes. The bluebirds fledged and headed down to the neighbor's grassy lawns. Then the male & female returned and have now taken over an old Red-bellied Woodpecker hole in a pine about 25' up over the garage. & we have 7 turkeys - 4 males and 3 females - eating the wild strawberries growing in our yard all day every day.

[Tom]

One of the joys of this time of year is sitting with a cup of coffee, the windows open listening to all the birds shouting at each other before daybreak. Another is riding in the woods, stopping for a bit to listen to the thrushes.

[GeneK]

I was away for 4 days, had USPS hold the mail. Upon returning i noticed the wicker basket (“mail box”) outside the door had a lot of material in it (dried grass, dried blossoms from the pin oaks etc). Small bird exploded out of there when I took a look. Scared the **** out of me. Blindingly fast so I never got a good look at the bird. But… it’s not a typical nest e.g. made in a bowl shape. There’s sort of a tunnel- the nest seems to have a roof on it (?).
So, what small bird makes a roofed nest in a wicker basket?

[j44ke]

I was away for 4 days, had USPS hold the mail. Upon returning i noticed the wicker basket (“mail box”) outside the door had a lot of material in it (dried grass, dried blossoms from the pin oaks etc). Small bird exploded out of there when I took a look. Scared the **** out of me. Blindingly fast so I never got a good look at the bird. But… it’s not a typical nest e.g. made in a bowl shape. There’s sort of a tunnel- the nest seems to have a roof on it (?).
So, what small bird makes a roofed nest in a wicker basket?

If by small, you mean equal to or less than a chickadee, then it is probably a house wren. Their nest making errs on the side of extra everything. And they'll nest anywhere. Open mailboxes are a favorite as are hanging planters. And they build fast. I'm trying to convince the house wren not to use the bluebird box. I take the sticks out in the morning and he's rebuilt it by lunch. He doesn't even have a mate. He just wants to be prepared.

[Tom]

So here I sit attending an application disaster recovery test (incidentally, it takes a mainframe guy to walk the Windows server guys through how to reconfigure their system so it'll work when failed over... just saying...) and I am doing nothing looking out the window into the yew and hemlock when a little bird catches my eye. I get out the binoculars and I'll be darned if it isn't a cedar waxwing with a bill full of nest material. I haven't seen one at the feeders all year and there it is. Almost makes up for not riding today.

[Marvinlungwitz]

Attachment 118935

Sharp shinned hawk feasting on a dove in the front yard.

He left feathers, but not much else, which led to reading up on hawk bone digestion.

[Mabouya]

Any hummingbird feeders here?

I enjoy putting some sugar-water out for them, but as the temps warm (highs are now in the mid-90's and it's only getting worse) it tends to ferment and go cloudy / sour pretty quickly, and cleaning out the feeders is a bit of a hassle.

Anyone have any good secrets on how to postpone things going bad? (The only things I've found online is to boil the mixture after having made it, and putting a lot of effort into cleaning the feeder. The house is warm enough as it is, I'll be darned if I run the stove top any more than it has to be.)

[j44ke]

Any hummingbird feeders here?

I enjoy putting some sugar-water out for them, but as the temps warm (highs are now in the mid-90's and it's only getting worse) it tends to ferment and go cloudy / sour pretty quickly, and cleaning out the feeders is a bit of a hassle.

Anyone have any good secrets on how to postpone things going bad? (The only things I've found online is to boil the mixture after having made it, and putting a lot of effort into cleaning the feeder. The house is warm enough as it is, I'll be darned if I run the stove top any more than it has to be.)

I make a gallon at a time, put it in the fridge. Then I use a relatively small simple feeder. Less than 12oz but 8oz is plenty for most places. Dump, rinse every other day or so. Then wash once a week.

This is a good simple feeder. Get a bottle brush. Makes cleaning quicker and easier. Hummingbirds don't need flowers-shaped feeders. They know what hummingbird feeders are. If they drain the feeder in less than a day, then add another feeder. Don't get a larger feeder. Put the second feeder a decent distance from the other feeder to make it hard for one hummingbird to defend both feeders.

If you hang the feeder in the shade, it will stay cooler. But if you hang it from a tree, you'll need an ant-trap to prevent ants from drowning themselves in the feeder.

Edit: Of course, I'm not using one now because of bears. Our neighbor is on his third feeder having lost two already this year. We planted penstemon instead and the hummers come to that each morning.