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YggiDee posted:Also it can take a while for birds to figure out that you have food, some will pass by at the start of the season and if you didn't have anything, they won't check back until next year. This is why I occasionally have to take the feeder down for a few months. I don't mind one or two common grackles, they're rather pretty, but once they figure out I have food I routinely see my yard covered in twenty or thirty of the bastards. Ditto for the boat-tails, though I've stopped seeing them much in general in the last couple of years. quote:Hmm, I know orioles like fruit and nectar (with apparently a preference for oranges?) but their bills don't fit in most hummingbird feeders. Cedar waxwings also like fruit and blossoms, I once saw an entire flock mob and strip an apple tree. Pileated woodpeckers are HUGE and shy, I don't know if they'll go for a suet feeder, you might have to give them a whole dead tree. Oh, I'm not trying to attract the other neighborhood birds to my feeder.  I just like birds and notice the birds I see in my (shady and borderline overgrown) yard and those I see around the neighborhood when I go jogging. The carolina wrens have figured out that bugs are attracted to windows with lights in them in the evening and will sometimes camp out on the windowsill waiting for bugs.quote:Actually that might be a factor, I don't know what seasons birds are active in down in Florida, like right now I'm pretty sure half your birds are up north with me right now. If I ever manage to dig up my bird book again I'll get back to you on that one. The only seasonal birds I've noticed around here are gray catbirds and various indeterminate species of warblers. The arrival of the catbirds and hearing them calling in the bushes is as sure a sign of fall down here as the human snowbirds.  The titmice are adorable and fun to watch, but they're the most skittish bird in my area except maybe the downy woodpeckers.
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Jul 27, 2016 20:30
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Here's where I learned about becoming friends with birds: http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-31604026 And here's the YouTube tutorial I followed (it's a little dorky): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gAnzZesTL3Y
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Jul 27, 2016 23:06
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There aren't any nesting raven pairs around me, but if I start collecting road kill the family of turkey vultures with the nest a few blocks away might take an interest. I like to go for drives on weekends, I consistently see splattered skunks and pulped porcupines. That would also probably annoy my neighbours, but adding a species to the list that visit my balcony seems like a worthy goal. I should talk to my cousin about this - he owns a company that makes birdseed. Walmart carries it but it's a bit more expensive than the generic / house brand stuff, and I can't make any honest claims about Topcrop Blue Jay & Cardinal mix's ability to attract more or a greater variety of species to your feeder (I buy it out of family loyalty). He used to keep a bowl of dried mixed berries on his desk, straight off the production line downstairs. I wonder if I could convince him to market a line of Raven & Vulture food...
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Jul 28, 2016 04:17
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My experience is that everything loves black sunflower seeds, so just by a bulk bag of them, shelled if you want to avoid the mess, and fill your feeders with that. When we had a window feeder in London (went through several iterations, only the squirrel buster with an additional weight kept out the big birds and squirrels effectively) we had: Lesser+greater spotted woodpecker Eurasian jay Blue/great/coal tits Gold/green/chaffinches Rose ringed parakeet Relentless collared doves Pigeon Dunnock Probably more I'm forgetting Squirrel And they all loved black sunflower seeds. The squirrel was the funniest, we had a tray type feeder at one point, and it would climb inside, stuff itself until it couldn't move, then curl up and go to sleep for a few hours, then wake up and eat some more. We tried lacing the seed with chili pepper, having read that birds don't mind but it'll drive squirrels off... That little poo poo climbed up, stuffed his face, *paused*, his little eye started watering, then he kept on eating! Guess he liked spicy food!
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Jul 28, 2016 04:30
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From PYF.
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Jul 31, 2016 16:20
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Cythereal posted:From PYF. Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree Merry merry king of the bush is he! Sing! kookaburra, sing! kookaburra sing your song for me! Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree Eating all the OI! GET THE FACK AWAY FROM ME BARBIE YA FAT oval office!
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Aug 1, 2016 06:28
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Hi birding thread! I'm still very new to birding in general but decided to start as a way to get outside more and help with depression. I live in a very rural area of northeast Georgia. Currently this year I've seen a few cool things on our property, including: -Red tailed hawks, plus their nests -Turkey vultures (they roost next to the house!) -So many brown thrashers -Chickadees, my favorite birds -Robins -Very rarely, blue jays and cardinals. We used to have a lot more but when we switched to just plain sunflower seeds, they visited less. I'm psyched to get some more supplies, namely binocs and a field guide. Up until now I've just been using my phone, haha.
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Oct 29, 2016 16:03
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Tofu Terry posted:Hi birding thread! Hi! Chickadees are my favorite too. When looking for a field guide, get one with drawings, like a Peterson. The ones with photos are fun to have, but not as useful for identification.
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Oct 29, 2016 17:54
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Tofu Terry posted:Hi birding thread! Binoculars will open up a whole world- do it!
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Oct 29, 2016 19:53
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Welcome to birding! I'm in DC and the cardinals come eat out of my land here.  
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Oct 29, 2016 20:02
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WrenP-Complete posted:Welcome to birding! I'm in DC and the cardinals come eat out of my land here. I'm in Florida. Titmice visit my windowsill regularly. There's no food or anything, I just periodically have a small, hyperactive grey bird getting very confused about the existence of a window. Cardinals and wrens also occasionally do it.
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Oct 29, 2016 21:02
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Hey bird thread. I got into birding in May of this year, when a coworker (lifelong birder) got me interested in it. Not sure what exactly prompted it for me, but I soon got a field guide, binoculars, some of the apps, registered on eBird, and have enjoyed all of it. Before that, I had thought (like probably many people) that "birdwatching" was just something old people did while sitting on the porch in the morning, and didn't really think anything more of it beyond that. Thanks to resources like this thread, it became clear to me how wrong I was, and how much depth it really has. It's a nice way to enjoy nature, you can do it wherever you travel, it's something you can do through your whole life, and it gives you a knowledge you can keep building on over that whole time. I'm at almost 70 species on my list now, and it kind of amazes me how much I've been able to learn just by going out, seeing some bird I don't know, and researching and identifying it. It's also sort of a curse, though. I do a lot of running (especially on trails), and it's almost impossible for me to go on a run now without being distracted by some unique-sounding call and wishing I could just stop every time to try and see what the drat thing is.  I'd be interested in knowing if anyone else shares this pain while running/biking/whatever.Might as well throw a long-shot identification question out, too. One evening in the summer I was in the parking area of a trail, and I heard this really loud bird in a nearby tree doing a distinct "OOO-EHH! OOO-EHH!" It made that sound in pairs, stayed quiet for a short time, and then did it again. Unfortunately, couldn't see it at all. I heard this for maybe 30 seconds before I saw its very vague silhouette through a tree as it flew down near some road out of my sight. All I could vaguely tell was that it was fairly sizeable, I was thinking at least as big as a hawk, but I had absolutely no view of colors, shape, etc. I looked up some birds assuming maybe some kind of a hawk or falcon or something, but no species that I listened to seemed match the tone or cadence of the call I heard. Any obvious ones that come to mind? This was in southeastern Pennsylvania in probably July/August.
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Oct 29, 2016 23:29
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waffy posted:Hey bird thread. I got into birding in May of this year, when a coworker (lifelong birder) got me interested in it. Not sure what exactly prompted it for me, but I soon got a field guide, binoculars, some of the apps, registered on eBird, and have enjoyed all of it. Before that, I had thought (like probably many people) that "birdwatching" was just something old people did while sitting on the porch in the morning, and didn't really think anything more of it beyond that. Thanks to resources like this thread, it became clear to me how wrong I was, and how much depth it really has. It's a nice way to enjoy nature, you can do it wherever you travel, it's something you can do through your whole life, and it gives you a knowledge you can keep building on over that whole time. Possibly some kind of owl? Listen to some owl calls, see if anything sounds like it. They don't all go hoot hoot! I just got back from Corpus Cristi (Port Aransas actually) and did a bunch of birding around there. Didn't make it down to the Rio Grande valley but saw a lot of cool stuff. My favourites were a flock of Skimmers settling down for the evening, occasionally all getting up in the air to dip and dive. Such cool, weird birds. Greater kiskadees are really neat too!
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Oct 30, 2016 00:40
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Oh I forgot to ask! Does anyone have a recommendation for decent binoculars under $100? No plans on night watching or anything like that so I don't need the super advanced ones. If it makes a difference, I also wear glasses.
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Oct 30, 2016 19:28
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Tofu Terry posted:Oh I forgot to ask! Does anyone have a recommendation for decent binoculars under $100? No plans on night watching or anything like that so I don't need the super advanced ones. You might want to try to go a little higher than that- for example, the Nikon Monarch 8x42s are a great intro pair. There's a big uptick in quality as you get to $200-$300. In general 8x40 is a good Magnification x Field of View for birding. Look for weatherproof, and for glasses, adjustable eye-cups.
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Oct 30, 2016 20:24
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Anything outside of a dollar store all-plastic toy should have adjustable eye cups. Waterproof is a great idea, though. My Porro-prism Bushnell's from 8 years ago are waterproof 8x42 that cost almost exactly $100 back then. Similar to this: http://bushnell.com/wildlife/binoculars/legacy-wp/8x-42mm A couple of years ago I gave my GF a set of Pentax Roof-prism binos and she absolutely loves the hell out of them. About $240, but there was a sale and I think regular price was around $300. Decent, waterproof binoculars don't seem to be something that shows up much on the second-hand market, most of the used stuff is really old, and really crappy. So there aren't many deals to be found there. A good place to look for birdwatching binos is a hunting/fishing/outdoors store, especially the big-box stores (Cabela's, for example). Sometimes their house brands - which are just re-branded from a major manufacturer - can get you something pretty good for not much money.
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Oct 31, 2016 21:44
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Nice to see some new blood in this thread. For anyone looking for binoculars I highly reccomend trying these Vanguard Endeavor ED 8x42. Amazon WarehouseDeals (basically open box) is selling them for under $150 as I type this, which is a steal. I paid a similar price a few years ago and they're still my main binoculars. I liked them so much I bought another pair so I could have one in the car and one in the house. https://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B005DQG5SC/ref=sr_1_1_olp?ie=UTF8&qid=1478042109&sr=8-1&keywords=vanguard+endeavor+ed&condition=used I moved to a new house over the summer. I was optimistic when we moved here, but I've been downright blown away by how awesome the birding is in my yard. I'm up to almost 110 species seen or heard (I think the only heard-only bird is Great-Horned Owl) since June. It makes it really hard to get anything accomplished. I've interrupted family meals a couple times because there's a Hutton's Vireo or Townsend's Warbler flitting around in the cedar trees next to the dining room window. And chicadees (both Black-capped and Chestnut-backed) like crazy.
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Nov 2, 2016 00:33
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Hello birder people. I took some extremely, extremely amateur photos of some birds around my campus with a cheap point and shoot camera and I was wondering if they could be identified, because i know nothing about the great race of bird-dom. I live in the Rio Grande Valley, in south texas.    (this one's hard to spot)   
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Nov 23, 2016 02:37
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Looks like a Great Kiskadee to me based on the white eye stripe in the first photo. I initially thought Western Kingbird.quote:
quote:quote:
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Nov 23, 2016 02:50
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Chelb posted:Texas Birds I'll take a stab at it, but I'm not familiar with Texas birds and am making educated guesses from a field guide.  This is probably a Great Kiskadee. The bad news is that a small brown bird in fall in Texas could be Literally Anything. Migratory bottleneck and all that. The good news is that you got a perfect shot of its yellow butt, and the Yellow-Rumped Warbler is the only bird so famous for having a yellow butt that it's named for it. This is a Cormorant, or possibly an Anhinga. I don't know enough about either to make a call, but they are related birds and they're sorta weird. Ooh ooh I know this one! That's almost certainly a Great Egret! E: well I'm soundly beaten but my guesses match so
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Nov 23, 2016 03:07
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Chelb posted:Hello birder people. I took some extremely, extremely amateur photos of some birds around my campus with a cheap point and shoot camera and I was wondering if they could be identified, because i know nothing about the great race of bird-dom. I was just in southern texas birding! The first as folks mentioned is a Great Kiskadee. The second is definitely a Yellow Rumped Warbler. The snakey necked cormoranty guys are Anhinga. I saw them up close in Florida, and the habitat you found them in is appropriate for them. They're weird... kind of fuzzy and they have a gland on their rump that they use to waterproof themselves. The ducks are Black-bellied Whistling Ducks.
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Nov 23, 2016 03:20
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Thanks a lot, everyone!
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Nov 23, 2016 03:31
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Rio Grande Valley is one of the best regions of the country for birds. Hope you stick with it!
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Nov 23, 2016 05:36
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Who is ready for baby eagles?! The eagles here are due any day now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gymPFiPE88I Since watching this I have learned that bald eagle males are 25% smaller than females. Current status: two snug eggs. http://abc7ny.com/news/watch-live-florida-bald-eagle-eggs-expected-to-hatch/1675668/ quote:The Southwest Florida Eagle Cam has seen millions of people tune in since it launched in 2012, when Harriet was with her previous mate, Ozzie. Current status: PIPPING! WrenP-Complete fucked around with this message at 21:20 on Dec 29, 2016 |
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Dec 29, 2016 14:33
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We've had some snow here recently, and when I was walking up to my house I saw something half-peeking out of the sidewalk. It looked like it might be a glove or maybe something made out of dark rubber or plastic, so I slid my foot under one edge of it and flipped it over to clear the snow off. Nope, that's not a glove, that's totally a dead bird and the squirrels have already eaten off the head and most of the chest 
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Jan 11, 2017 18:27
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Hey guys, I ran into a tired (I hope) cormorant that the rescue nearby suspected was blown around by the storm. Herded her away from some playing dogs nearby and cornered her to check for broken limbs, blood, etc and didn't find anything. After that she decided I was alright and chilled out with me while I talked to various rescues over the phone. After this picture I herded her back onto the beach and she went back out onto the harbor, so hopefully she's alright. Sorry for the lovely quality, this was taken on the iphone I had with me on my walk.  At least I think it's a young female? Dana Point harbor, so I suspect a female double crested cormorant. Chaosfeather fucked around with this message at 11:32 on Jan 12, 2017 |
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Jan 12, 2017 10:37
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I don't know that you can tell male from female, but looks like a young double-crested cormorant. Unless it's oiled, looking really uncoordinated, or has an obvious drooping wing, I'd probably leave it alone. But good job to get it away from the dogs.
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Jan 12, 2017 18:00
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Hey there! I'm glad I found that this thread exists because I've recently become a birder. It wasn't my intent but I put up a bird feeder in the backyard and, well, it took off and I became interested and obsessed. I bought a few books about birds in Iowa (I live in central Iowa). I mostly observe birds at the bird feeder in the backyard from the kitchen window. I put my bird book and binoculars there. Boy do they really help! But I tell you the feeders get crowded as gently caress. There have been times here in the winter where I've used a 20 pound bag of feed within a week! Some photos. They're not very good, not like some in this thread and I apologize for that. A photo I took a while ago showing how crowded it can get around the feeders. There are a lot of brown birds that come that I haven't quite identified yet. And I'm not sure if the photos are any help. I apologize. I set up the feeders in the fall and so haven't had a lot of opportunities to sit outside in good weather to take photos. But I plan to in the spring / summer. I have identified dark-eyed juncos and I've thought that the brown birds may be the female juncos but I'm not entirely sure. Their beaks are black on top and yellow on bottom. I've thought House Wren too but the books says they are in central Iowa / Iowa in the summer. My best bet is American Tree Sparrow but I don't think they have brown caps. I just don't know. It's probably some sort of sparrow.  A cardinal at the red feeder we have. I had to get one of these flat ones because of the bigger birds like cardinals and blue jays. Sometimes they are quite a few blue jays.  The possible Red-Bellied Woodpecker I named "Norm". There are so many birds at the feeder I've started naming some of the frequent patrons after characters from Cheers. I've named this bird Norm because he's there all the time.  Needless to say I recognize more individual birds at the feeders than I do my neighbors. I do need help identifying one bird for sure. This bird came around last spring and just sat like this in front of the front door. I managed to get ridiculously close to it and it never moved. It didn't die. I worried about it and was in the process of thinking of putting out some water or something but it eventually left right before sundown. Never saw it again. I'm thinking it's some kind of warbler but I don't know which one.  Also, I'm not sure what kind of birds THESE are! They're big though and a few days ago I saw up to six of them. Probably part of the reason I use up so much feed. These and the weird furry birds called "squirrels". 
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Jan 12, 2017 23:42
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bean_shadow posted:I do need help identifying one bird for sure. This bird came around last spring and just sat like this in front of the front door. I managed to get ridiculously close to it and it never moved. It didn't die. I worried about it and was in the process of thinking of putting out some water or something but it eventually left right before sundown. Never saw it again. I'm thinking it's some kind of warbler but I don't know which one. I'm a casual birder, but I'm pretty sure what you have there is a female (or juvenile male) Magnolia Warbler!
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Jan 13, 2017 00:00
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I'm not certain on your mystery bird, but I'm guessing that it's an off-season/nonbreeding Magnolia Warbler. They're quite striking in the spring!
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Jan 13, 2017 00:06
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For the birds on the ground- the one in front and the one in the upper right look like juncos, and the cluster behind appear to be house sparrows. The warbler likely hit a window and became dazed. Either they recover or they don't, so glad it was ok! Beauty of a bird.
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Jan 13, 2017 00:35
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bean_shadow posted:The possible Red-Bellied Woodpecker I named "Norm". There are so many birds at the feeder I've started naming some of the frequent patrons after characters from Cheers. I've named this bird Norm because he's there all the time. That's definitely a red-bellied. I see them all the time at my feeder, they're obnoxious little assholes.
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Jan 13, 2017 00:52
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BetterLekNextTime posted:The warbler likely hit a window and became dazed. Either they recover or they don't, so glad it was ok! Beauty of a bird. I was really worried because it let me get so close. I thought it was sick or something. I hope it ended up OK. It left, so that was a good sign.
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Jan 13, 2017 14:00
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BetterLekNextTime posted:and the cluster behind appear to be house sparrows. House Sparrows are in the family Passeridae, but native North American sparrows are in the family Emberizidae. Many guidebooks group birds by taxonomy, so the native emberizid sparrows will appear in a separate section from the passerids. If you want to prevent future bird-on-window hits, there's a bunch of advice here: http://www.flap.org/ What guidebooks do you have? There are several good ones covering all of North America, and another range covering regions like "east of the Rockies", as well as state-level guides that vary widely in quality.
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Jan 13, 2017 15:40
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ExecuDork posted:What guidebooks do you have? There are several good ones covering all of North America, and another range covering regions like "east of the Rockies", as well as state-level guides that vary widely in quality. The book I use is Birds of Iowa Field Guide by Stan Tekiela. The House Sparrow is in the book but the photos they have don't look like the ones in the yard. So I looked up the House Sparrow on the iBird app and it was a match. The only other book I have is National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of North America Sixth Edition.
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Jan 13, 2017 16:32
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bean_shadow posted:The only other book I have is National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of North America Sixth Edition. I kept track of the birds I saw at my balcony feeder last year. I'm in Waterloo, Ontario.
I think my neighbours and my landlord would complain if I tried putting out roadkill on my balcony for the scavengers. I think the insectivores would appreciate the maggot supply, though.
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Jan 14, 2017 22:36
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Might as well do the same, the birds I've seen at my feeder. I'm in Port St. Lucie, Florida: * Blue Jay * Northern Cardinal * House Sparrow * Mourning Dove * Common Grackle * Boat-tailed Grackle * Downy Woodpecker * Red-bellied Woodpecker * Northern Flicker * Brown Thrasher * Redwing Blackbird * Tufted Titmouse * Bobwhite * Barred Owl (hunting squirrels and rabbits) The doves, jays, cardinals, and red-bellied woodpeckers are my most common visitors and I see them every day. The sparrows, common crackles, thrashers, blackbirds, and titmice are also common. The flicker and bobwhite were both one-offs, but I've seen the owl a few times now - doesn't seem to care about the birds, it wants squirrels and rabbits. There's always northern mockingbirds around, since this is Florida and they're everywhere, but as insectivores they don't come to the feeder. Ditto the carolina wrens I see around a lot.
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Jan 15, 2017 01:14
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This is what I had in eBird for my yard- I'm sure I have another few dozen I see/here occasionally that are on a list somewhere . I'm in Bay Area, California. Lucky to have a (relatively) large yard near a lot of open space/regional parks. I put asterisks by the most common ones. 1 Canada Goose 2 American White Pelican *3 Turkey Vulture *4 Sharp-shinned Hawk *5 Cooper's Hawk *6 Red-tailed Hawk *7 Rock Pigeon 8 Band-tailed Pigeon *9 Eurasian Collared-Dove *10 Mourning Dove *11 Anna's Hummingbird 12 Acorn Woodpecker *13 Nuttall's Woodpecker *14 Downy Woodpecker 15 Hairy Woodpecker 16 Northern Flicker 17 Merlin *18 Black Phoebe 19 Steller's Jay *20 California Scrub-Jay *21 American Crow *22 Common Raven *23 Chestnut-backed Chickadee *24 Oak Titmouse *25 Bushtit *26 Red-breasted Nuthatch 27 Pygmy Nuthatch *28 Bewick's Wren *29 Ruby-crowned Kinglet 30 Hermit Thrush *31 American Robin 32 Varied Thrush *33 Northern Mockingbird *34 European Starling *35 Cedar Waxwing *36 Yellow-rumped Warbler 37 Townsend's Warbler *38 Fox Sparrow *39 Dark-eyed Junco *40 White-crowned Sparrow *41 Golden-crowned Sparrow 42 White-throated Sparrow 43 Song Sparrow 44 Lincoln's Sparrow *45 California Towhee *46 Spotted Towhee *47 House Finch 48 Purple Finch 49 Pine Siskin *50 Lesser Goldfinch *51 American Goldfinch
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Jan 15, 2017 02:08
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I'm trying to ID a bird by its call. It's very loud, and the best I can render it it's like "Keeeeeuh", very high-pitched at first and then it falls off a cliff right at the end; this will repeat usually several times, with several seconds between calls. Sometimes the second part is almost silent. I *think* it's about the size of a large dove and possibly has a pinkish breast. It's hard to say because it loves perching at the top of the tree outside my window and tormenting me by staying out of sight. I'm in Sacramento, and I hear these almost every day. Please free me from this hateful ignorance.
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Jan 15, 2017 02:47
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Chard posted:I'm trying to ID a bird by its call. It's very loud, and the best I can render it it's like "Keeeeeuh", very high-pitched at first and then it falls off a cliff right at the end; this will repeat usually several times, with several seconds between calls. Sometimes the second part is almost silent. I *think* it's about the size of a large dove and possibly has a pinkish breast. It's hard to say because it loves perching at the top of the tree outside my window and tormenting me by staying out of sight. I'm in Sacramento, and I hear these almost every day. Please free me from this hateful ignorance. Maybe listen to Red-shouldered Hawk https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Red-shouldered_Hawk/sounds
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Jan 15, 2017 03:19
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