Filed under: Age-appropriate, KidPost, Practice, Teaching, birdwatching | Tags: bird feeders, building
Grandpère and I made a bird feeder together this morning!
Filed under: Birds Seen, MamaPost, What's that bird?, birdwatching | Tags: birds, identification, reasoning
LittleBirder and I were looking at chickadees and a titmouse on the feeder.
Me (indicating the titmouse): And do you know what that one is?
LittleBirder, after thinking: Is it a baby blue jay?
A bit later, he wanted a blue jay to come inside and keep him company (we hadn’t seen a blue jay today).
Filed under: Birds Heard, Birds Seen, birdwatching | Tags: bird feeding, birds, songbirds
We started feeding the birds again last week. And before that, Granddad helped LittleBirder fill the feeders too.
This morning is very busy out there! Between 8 and 9 a.m. we’ve seen a hairy woodpecker (possibly a female), a red squirrel who isn’t Stubbs, a pair (or more) of juncos, two blue jays chasing each other, three or more chickadees, a titmouse, a white-breasted nuthatch.
Filed under: Birds Heard, Birds Seen, birdwatching | Tags: birds, hawks, cooper's hawks
We saw a whole family of Cooper’s Hawks over our house today. I think there were four: 2 adults, 2 young. Very talkative, lots of cheeking sorts of sounds.
We took ourselves out for a walk today, LittleBirder and I. Near our home is a pair of ponds. In a fit of practicality, I dubbed them “High Pond” and “Low Pond”, referring to their elevations with respect to dirt road that runs between them. There’s easy access to the ponds, even with the raspberries nearby (these are blooming white today).
Overhead, we saw at least two male Red-winged blackbirds and just down the road over the meadow, an American Robin—on a different wire this time, although for all I know it was the same bird as we saw last week. I spotted an Eastern Phoebe on a dead branch dropping low across the stream (there’s a stream just to the north of the ponds, running roughly east; we saw the Phoebe from the bridge).
At home, we saw a male Indigo Bunting on the feeder with the thistle seed. Blue is our favorite color.
We’d mention the amphibians and fish and insects and flowers we saw today too… except we pretend this blog is only about birds. *chuckle* So go see Mama’s blog if you want to know more…
LittleBirder and I have just added more birdseed (black oil sunflower and mixed “songbird” seed; there’s enough thistle for now) to te empty feeders and to the rocks. We’re now waiting to “Let’s see who comes.”
Blackflies, mostly.
I swoosh away a bug, saying, “There’s a bug flying around my face.”
LittleBirder replies, “That happens outside sometimes , Mama.”
LittleBirder helps me clean the front door window with vinegar and paper towels*.
“Mama, now I’m all done and you’re all done and I better put the towel in the trash.”
“Thank you! Now I’ll go sit by the window and drink my coffee and watch birds.” He wants to write in my notebook too, so I send him to look for his. He comes back with his toy giraffes.
We see a pair of cardinals … chickadees .. the white-crowned sparrow … a female goldfinch … a titmouse. We also see at least one of the feeders is empty. At 2 and a tad, he’s really into scooping and pouring.
“Mama, can we feed the birds?”
“Sure.”
“I better get my shoes on.” … and from the other room, a moment later, “I’m running really fast to get my shoes on!”
