Birds and other creatures

My birdfeeding station is officially the coolest hangout spot for the Blaine bird scene. Here are some of the birds we have been getting.

Last summer, we got a lot of Black-Headed Grosbeaks. They ate us out of house and home. Then they migrated on to warmer, more friendly climates.

We also got flocks of goldfinches. They also ate us out of house, home, and nyjer seed. They come back occasionally, now in their brown winter plumage. Usually they bring Pine Siskin with them, tiny little birds who are always cheery and remind me a little bit of Colorado's Lesser Goldfinches, whom I miss terribly.

House Finches and Purple Finches usually frequent our feeders when there is enough black oil seed. In Colorado, they were our most common birds. Here, we have about 10 who come and go.

A Female House Finch

By far, our most prolific visitors are our Black-Capped and Chestnut-Backed Chickadees. I think this is some sort of payback for all the chickadees I wasn't able to attract last year. They are constant here. Once we counted 12 on the feeders at once, which is pretty significant, seeing as how chickadees don't stay and eat at feeders like most other birds. Their primary mode of feeding is to sort through the seeds, throwing all the small ones onto the ground, finding the largest and most unwieldy seed there, and then carry it up into the trees and pound it into the bark to save for later, where it is promptly found and eaten by some other bird who was waiting for this moment. Occasionally, the chickadees' hunger gets the better of them and they have to eat at the feeders. But still, the larger the better. Chickadees refuse to eat small seeds on principle. They are the second-to-lowest on the universal wild bird pecking order and just about anyone can chase them off. This annoys them to no end, but it never keeps them from coming back.

A Couple of Chestnut Backed Chickadees

A Couple More Chickadees and a Dark Eyed Junco

Occasionally, chickadees have let us hand-feed them, when they are truly desperate (as in, all the seed is running out, they've been forced to humiliate themselves by eating seeds that can actually fit in their mouths, and they haven't had new food for 10 minutes). However, they are smart, and know that if they just wait long enough, we will refill the feeders for them. Andrew wants me to train them to hand-feed by not filling up the feeders right away. I can't resist the sad confusion in their little eyes.

Our suet has become a favorite in the winter. We have two pairs of Downy Woodpeckers, one normal pair, and one tiny, tiny pair. We also have a pair of Hairy Woodpeckers that come and go. They are bigger than the Downies by a lot. Mr. Hairy and the larger Mr. Downy got into a fight a couple of weeks ago, which Mr. Hairy won. Mr. Downy was crushed and left the feeders. I thought he was gone forever, even though his wife continued coming back. He came back for the first time today. I was relieved.

Ms. Downey

Tiny, Tiny Ms. Downey

We also get a couple of large Flickers, who are very clumsy and spill a lot of food. To see what happens to it, keep reading. They like to perch at the very top of the feeding system and eat and eat and eat. Their territory battles haven't begun yet.

A couple weeks ago, we got our first Pileated Woodpecker! She is enormous and looks a little bit like a dinosaur. For awhile, she ate from our tiny little suet feeder that we have mounted underneath the peanut feeder to keep larger birds away. She was undeterred. Now we have a suet feeder mounted up high for her benefit. She lands on our roof and walks around for awhile, then she goes to eat, and it sounds like she is drilling a hole in a tree. She sounds like a chicken when she calls. Considering Pileated Woodpeckers typically have a range of 200 acres (more if there is not constant forest cover) we can expect just to get her and a mate.

Ms. Pileated

Our peanuts are a favorite for our three local nuthatches. As you might recall, I can communicate with nuthatches. We had a hard time attracting them, but just recently realized that our lack of nuthatches coincided with our lack of peanuts. Now we have peanuts. And nuthatches. They are above the chickadees in the pecking order, and are not afraid to remind the chickadees of this.

What with the chickadees throwing out every seed that is beneath their dignity (which is most of them) and the flickers spitting out large mouthfuls of suet by accident, you might wonder how much we waste by birdfeeding. The answer is, nothing. Because of nature's trash can, the Dark Eyed Juncos. Juncos eat anything, as long as it is on a flat, level surface. They especially love flicker leftovers. Juncos are hard to notice at first, and then you look a bit closer, and realize the ground is crawling with them.

An inconspicuous Junco

Also on the ground, we attract Towhees (reading Annie Dillard's passage about them is highly worthwhile start on the second to last paragraph on the page), Fox Sparrows, Song Sparrows, and Golden-Crowned Sparrows from the woods. They hop around, eating scraps. Occasionally we get White-Crowned Sparrows, too. House Sparrows come and go. They tend to be by on the colder days.

A Towhee- or is it a Bear?

For awhile, we had only one Mourning Dove. She sat on the ground, all fluffed up and sad, and I was afraid the cold was going to do her in. Now she has two friends, and she is considerably happier. They are all very skittish, and tend to panic when they hear noises, but they like our seed, and they always come back.

The Loyal Mourning Dove

In the past few days, we've had a few new species. We've had two Stellar's Jays come by to claim our feeders for themselves. They are the second-to-top on the bird pecking order (right below the Pileated Woodpecker), but whereas Miss Pileated comes once a week or so, they want to be there all the time. Without any chickadees. This drives the chickadees crazy. So we are contemplating setting up a feeding station more suited to jays and large woodpeckers somewhere else, and leaving the chickadees in peace.

Also, we had our very first bushtit invasion! Bushtits are small birds, very small birds in fact, who look like gray cotton balls with tails. They come in droves of about 30, and crowd onto suet and peanuts, chattering and chirping away. They are below even the chickadees in the pecking order, and the chickadees are happy to remind them of this. Unfortunately for the chickadees, bushtits know that there is strength in numbers, and by swarming around a chickadee like a flock of fluffy insects, they can annoy the chickadee enough to make it back off. Then, for a few minutes, they have the feeders all to themselves, where they barely make a dent in them because they are so small. They swarm under, around, and--get this--INSIDE them. Yes, inside. Come and see our suet cage sometime, and wonder how on earth a bird fits inside there. But they do. I've seen them. Then the leader of the flock decides it's time to leave, and they all flitter off after him, except for one, which is always, inevitably, left behind, blissfully unaware, for probably a minute longer. Then it realizes its comrades have left, and hurries off.

Andrew has also created a pond, which attracts all our groundfeeding birds, chickadees, and American Robins! They are really cute when they bathe.

And today, we had a possum come to our feeders! Actually, it was yesterday that I saw it first. I was getting on my coat to go to work, and lo and behold, I looked outside, and a possum was walking across the yard! I shouted to Andrew to come see it. It ambled across and slipped under the fence, all nonchalant and unbothered by the fact that it's supposed to be nocturnal. Then today, I was watching my birdfeeders, and all of a sudden, a little possum face emerged from around the corner. It hopped around, eating leftover leftovers. A possum! Can you believe that? It was incredibly exciting.

Can you believe it?

Well, I have to go to dance, but I hope you've all enjoyed this incredibly lengthy description of our local creature life.

Text by Rachel, Photos by Andrew (I hope to get some better ones once we have a sunny day.)