How sharp are you identifying bird calls and songs in your backyard? Do you find yourself calling out bird species while out in the woods? Or do you have to spot them with your binoculars and fumble through a printed guidebook to find them?
Don’t get me wrong. Field guides have their place to give you the details about any species you may observe. However, for even a novice birder they’re not the quickest way to identify a bird.
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Just like Julie Zickfoose had told me, my house wrens are behaving themselves because I’ve allowed them to have one of my bluebird houses. From early in the morning until late at night, I hear both of them singing and calling to each other. It’s actually quite sweet.
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As I’ve reported in an earlier post, my nesting season is going only OK this year. I’ve already seen my bluebirds and chickadees with their first bunch of little ones and I’ve only got one of my my two bluebird boxes with anything in it. And that something is house wrens.
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Just last week, my wife and I were talking about birds we’d seen and haven’t seen in our backyard this winter. Somehow, the conversation turned to one of my favorite little late winter visitors, Cedar Waxwings.
We normally don’t see them except in between flock movements from one part of the country to another. The Stokes guide I have says they stay year round not too far from us in Tennessee but I never see them during the summer. I believe it’s because the bushes and trees near us only have berries they want at the times we see them.
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With the recent near disaster bird strike of US Airways flight 1549, I thought my readers would be interested to know what bird management methods were employed by airports to reduce incidents like these.
The management of birds in and around an airport requires three main components:
Let’s look quickly at each of these.
Last winter I was putting out food on a cold weekday morning. As usual, the Blue Jays had spotted me and were squawking for peanuts. I’ve always found it uncanny how there won’t be one in my backyard until I toss peanuts onto my aggregate patio and the sound attracts them. Seemingly out of nowhere, they fly in from the four corners. It cracks me up.
That morning was no different. I set out my platform feeder feeder and went back inside to get some peanuts for it and the area around it. When I came out, there was a Blue Jay perched on the gutter behind me just staring at me. Because they are so quick to start I turned back around and went back to what I was doing. I turned around again and he was still perched there. I thought he looked like a pet waiting for a treat so I decided to give him one. I turned back away from him, took one peanut and tossed it straight up in the air just a little higher than he was perched. I almost fell over when he snagged it out of the air!
That’s right. He just aimed and snagged it. I’d never seen anything like it before.
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