Backyard Bird Survey
Apr 24, 2018 13:04:32 #
The prettiest birds I get are American Goldfinches but I couldn't even lure them with Niger seed this spring and Anna's Hummingbirds, which we feed all year round.
The most impressive is a Cooper's Hawk but it is only coming because I feed the smaller birds, which the hawk wants to eat.
Cedar Waxwings are nearby but I have no food they want.
House Finches are plentiful but boring.
Oh yes, Black Phoebe lives out there, too!
The most impressive is a Cooper's Hawk but it is only coming because I feed the smaller birds, which the hawk wants to eat.
Cedar Waxwings are nearby but I have no food they want.
House Finches are plentiful but boring.
Oh yes, Black Phoebe lives out there, too!
Apr 24, 2018 13:10:05 #
There's at least two and sometimes 3 nesting pairs of painted buntings that winter with me every year.
Apr 24, 2018 13:13:40 #
TheShoe
Loc: Lacey, WA
When I was living on 2.5 acres of woods, Pileated Woodpeckers nested in a tree just a few feet from my deck. They were my favorites at the time. Then hurricane Hugo went through less than a mile to the west and knocked down all of the dead trees in the area. That ended the Pileateds. Shortly after that, there was an explosion of the population of feral cats in the area that caused the disappearance of wood thrushes (one of the prettiest sounding songbirds in existence), quail and other ground-nesting birds. After a few years, a goshawk wintered in the woods and the feral cat population became 0. That allowed the return of the ground nesters. They were among my favorites and the goshawk was elevated to the same level as the songbirds.
Apr 24, 2018 13:15:09 #
driver3 wrote:
There's at least two and sometimes 3 nesting pairs of painted buntings winter with me every year.
I keep watching and watching to see this bird....great photo!
Apr 24, 2018 13:41:40 #
Thanks to all of you for your interesting replies and spectacular images! I see we are still on topic with coolest and prettiest. That's great. Really terrific photos and great posts from all over.
Apr 24, 2018 13:59:21 #
amfoto1
Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA
We have a surprising variety of birds in the San Francisco Bay area, where I live right now. I guess it's a major migratory stop for a lot of them... For many others it's a year-round home.
In my back yard....
Western jay, pretty and bold, but mean (they raid nests of other birds)....
Right outside my back door, waxwings show up briefly each year looking for a free meal. As soon as they strip the tree of all its berries, with not even a "thank you" they disappear...
Anna's hummingbirds are year round visitors, if you put out a feeder or have lots of flowering plants...
Tiny bush tits, barely larger than hummingbirds, like to nest in palm trees...
I don't have any photos of him, but a Harris hawk used to visit a lot because a neighbor had a number of exotic birds in an outdoor aviary. That attracted the hawk, which preys on other birds primarily....
Not right in my backyard, but close by. A black-crowned sparrow surveys his realm near a creek and pond....
I don't have any photos of them personally, but we even have one or more thriving flocks of parrots in the Bay Area... mostly red-headed conures. Apparently escapees that were imported mostly S. America. http://www.markbittner.net/parrot_pages/faq.html#whatkind
Also not literally right in my back yard, pelicans at a nearby lake ...
There are also often snowy egrets and bigger great herons in fields and streams...
As well as large blue heron (a daily visitor some times of year, to a friend's "yard"... er, ranch actually)....
And the much more petite black-crowned night heron (immature juvenile)...
A large flock of wild turkey call a nearby park home (though this one was photographed a bit farther north)...
Anywhere there's water, we have our share of pied-billed grebes...
And western grebes...
And, only 15 miles (as the gull flies) from the ocean, various species of noisy "dumpster ducks" are usually in the neighborhood...
Less rarely seen, only stopping off during migration, and not exactly in my back yard, are the occasional sandhill crane...
We used to have lots of Canada geese, too...
Several large flocks of Canada geese used to fly low over my house every morning, heading north to the local gold courses to feed, and then back south every evening to several nearby lakes where they liked to spend their nights and nested. Unfortunately for the geese, golfers got fed up with the goose poop on their greens and loud honks during their back swings, so now the eco-friendly Bay Area pays people to locate their nests, immerse the eggs in oil to smother the unborn chicks inside, then replace the eggs which will never hatch. Probably really frustrating for the adult birds, putting in time on eggs and never seeing any of them hatch. Now I rarely see more than a pair, sometimes only a single Canada.... often don't see or hear them at all. I really miss their large, noisy V-formations flying over like clockwork each day, even as a golfer.
Never saw them other than just a very rare glimpse of movement overhead at night, but I know we have owls in the neighborhood. I've heard them... and I've cleaned my rain gutters of the "balls" of bone and fur they regurgitate after a meal. I appreciate their efforts all the more, ever since field mice chewed wiring in my car so that the temp and fuel gauges wouldn't work!
Pretty as they are, one bird you DON'T want in your backyard... or the backyard of any nearby neighbors... is a peacock!
Have you ever heard a peacock? On a good day, they sound like the screams of someone being beaten and tortured. And they apparently never sleep... Loudly scream morning, noon and night!
Another bird you REALLY DON'T want in your backyard are California Vultures... a flock of maybe 6 or 8 of them roosted in the top of a neighbor's 50 foot tree and literally paved the ground under it with their poop in no time. They are VERY messy. They're also not particularly photogenic. (Sorry, no photos. I've tried... I really did! But they're just plain UGLY.) The only way my neighbor could get rid of them was to cut down the tree! And they probably just found another neighbor's tree to roost in!
I'm in the process of moving out of crowded, expensive, crazy Silicon Valley, to a VERY rural, Sierra foothill property that has 5 acres of yard with numerous trees of all sizes, up to an including several large heritage oaks (and A LOT of clearing work to be done, though I plan to leave it as natural as possible). We'll just have to wait and see what shows up there. I may plant a few berry or nut bearing trees to attract birds. On Friday I noticed a covey of quail scurrying from one hiding place to the next.
If the quiet, solitude, country roads and star-filled night skies really get to me... after 30 years of daily life around the urban Bay Area and it's bumper-to-bumper freeways... the "common loon" making strange calls in my yard might actually be ME. If so, I'll be sure to take a selfie and post it.
P.S. I sort of get a kick out of the folks who think they need to take a safari to Africa or other long trips to find worthwhile photo subjects.... They just need to look more carefully at what's right around home or nearby! Might be surprised. I was out shooting scenics at a local lighthouse when I saw this guy hunting in a field.... Of the two or three dozen other people in the immediate area, I think I was the only one who noticed him (or her?), even though the hawk was swooping by right overhead and landing sometimes within just a few feet of people....
In my back yard....
Western jay, pretty and bold, but mean (they raid nests of other birds)....
Right outside my back door, waxwings show up briefly each year looking for a free meal. As soon as they strip the tree of all its berries, with not even a "thank you" they disappear...
Anna's hummingbirds are year round visitors, if you put out a feeder or have lots of flowering plants...
Tiny bush tits, barely larger than hummingbirds, like to nest in palm trees...
I don't have any photos of him, but a Harris hawk used to visit a lot because a neighbor had a number of exotic birds in an outdoor aviary. That attracted the hawk, which preys on other birds primarily....
Not right in my backyard, but close by. A black-crowned sparrow surveys his realm near a creek and pond....
I don't have any photos of them personally, but we even have one or more thriving flocks of parrots in the Bay Area... mostly red-headed conures. Apparently escapees that were imported mostly S. America. http://www.markbittner.net/parrot_pages/faq.html#whatkind
Also not literally right in my back yard, pelicans at a nearby lake ...
There are also often snowy egrets and bigger great herons in fields and streams...
As well as large blue heron (a daily visitor some times of year, to a friend's "yard"... er, ranch actually)....
And the much more petite black-crowned night heron (immature juvenile)...
A large flock of wild turkey call a nearby park home (though this one was photographed a bit farther north)...
Anywhere there's water, we have our share of pied-billed grebes...
And western grebes...
And, only 15 miles (as the gull flies) from the ocean, various species of noisy "dumpster ducks" are usually in the neighborhood...
Less rarely seen, only stopping off during migration, and not exactly in my back yard, are the occasional sandhill crane...
We used to have lots of Canada geese, too...
Several large flocks of Canada geese used to fly low over my house every morning, heading north to the local gold courses to feed, and then back south every evening to several nearby lakes where they liked to spend their nights and nested. Unfortunately for the geese, golfers got fed up with the goose poop on their greens and loud honks during their back swings, so now the eco-friendly Bay Area pays people to locate their nests, immerse the eggs in oil to smother the unborn chicks inside, then replace the eggs which will never hatch. Probably really frustrating for the adult birds, putting in time on eggs and never seeing any of them hatch. Now I rarely see more than a pair, sometimes only a single Canada.... often don't see or hear them at all. I really miss their large, noisy V-formations flying over like clockwork each day, even as a golfer.
Never saw them other than just a very rare glimpse of movement overhead at night, but I know we have owls in the neighborhood. I've heard them... and I've cleaned my rain gutters of the "balls" of bone and fur they regurgitate after a meal. I appreciate their efforts all the more, ever since field mice chewed wiring in my car so that the temp and fuel gauges wouldn't work!
Pretty as they are, one bird you DON'T want in your backyard... or the backyard of any nearby neighbors... is a peacock!
Have you ever heard a peacock? On a good day, they sound like the screams of someone being beaten and tortured. And they apparently never sleep... Loudly scream morning, noon and night!
Another bird you REALLY DON'T want in your backyard are California Vultures... a flock of maybe 6 or 8 of them roosted in the top of a neighbor's 50 foot tree and literally paved the ground under it with their poop in no time. They are VERY messy. They're also not particularly photogenic. (Sorry, no photos. I've tried... I really did! But they're just plain UGLY.) The only way my neighbor could get rid of them was to cut down the tree! And they probably just found another neighbor's tree to roost in!
I'm in the process of moving out of crowded, expensive, crazy Silicon Valley, to a VERY rural, Sierra foothill property that has 5 acres of yard with numerous trees of all sizes, up to an including several large heritage oaks (and A LOT of clearing work to be done, though I plan to leave it as natural as possible). We'll just have to wait and see what shows up there. I may plant a few berry or nut bearing trees to attract birds. On Friday I noticed a covey of quail scurrying from one hiding place to the next.
If the quiet, solitude, country roads and star-filled night skies really get to me... after 30 years of daily life around the urban Bay Area and it's bumper-to-bumper freeways... the "common loon" making strange calls in my yard might actually be ME. If so, I'll be sure to take a selfie and post it.
P.S. I sort of get a kick out of the folks who think they need to take a safari to Africa or other long trips to find worthwhile photo subjects.... They just need to look more carefully at what's right around home or nearby! Might be surprised. I was out shooting scenics at a local lighthouse when I saw this guy hunting in a field.... Of the two or three dozen other people in the immediate area, I think I was the only one who noticed him (or her?), even though the hawk was swooping by right overhead and landing sometimes within just a few feet of people....
Apr 24, 2018 14:39:29 #
amfoto1 wrote:
We have a surprising variety of birds in the San F... (show quote)
What a wonderful, educational post. Awesome captures and stories. Best of luck in your new digs.
Apr 24, 2018 14:39:40 #
rfmaude41
Loc: Lancaster, Texas (DFW area)
A whole bunch; a few times a week, a red-tailed hawk (sits on the telephone wires), blue jays, mourning doves, bluebirds, robins, etc., all of them.....
Apr 24, 2018 14:56:44 #
"What's the coolest backyard bird in your eyes? I'm going with woodpeckers (especially the piliated), flickers and nutatches. "
Well based on it being one of the rarest visitors to my yard and that it often comes when it is too dark to photograph,
the coolest visitor to my yard is the great horned owl. However I love almost all the birds that come to my yard, from the Sharp-shinned and Cooper's hawks to the colorful Anna's hummingbirds and Western bluebirds and Northern flicker to the California quail and House finch and scrub jays. My least favorite by far are the crows!
Well based on it being one of the rarest visitors to my yard and that it often comes when it is too dark to photograph,
the coolest visitor to my yard is the great horned owl. However I love almost all the birds that come to my yard, from the Sharp-shinned and Cooper's hawks to the colorful Anna's hummingbirds and Western bluebirds and Northern flicker to the California quail and House finch and scrub jays. My least favorite by far are the crows!
Apr 24, 2018 15:39:59 #
Gene51 wrote:
Brave indeed! And Bold! Nuthatches and Black Capped Chickadees will do this in winter when food is scarce.
How cool is that!
Fran
Apr 24, 2018 15:40:53 #
Apr 24, 2018 15:44:46 #
amfoto1
Loc: San Jose, Calif. USA
Lots of nice shots folks!
I'm jealous of the birds some of you get to see and photograph! No cardinals or painted buntings around here, I'm afraid.
Maybe I do need to travel more.
I'm jealous of the birds some of you get to see and photograph! No cardinals or painted buntings around here, I'm afraid.
Maybe I do need to travel more.
Apr 24, 2018 15:45:17 #
Another favorite of mine is a reddish egret.
This is from Merritt Island Fl. Not exactly my backyard 👍
This is from Merritt Island Fl. Not exactly my backyard 👍
Apr 24, 2018 16:18:31 #
I wonder if there is a category for George, he looks left out.
Finches, sparrows and doves, George just wants to be your friend. He will gladly invite you to dinner.
(Download)
Apr 24, 2018 17:03:49 #
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