Happy Thanksgiving!

Well, it's been a busy week with Thanksgiving coming up so we haven't been doing too much birding. And, with the days getting shorter, we have almost no time during the week. We always scan the backyard when we get home but usually there's not a lot of activity (or daylight). But, we still see signs of birdie visits (empty feeders, no suet) so we know they are still with us. Tomorrow, we will give them a little extra so that they can enjoy a feast, too!

Here are a few photos that we have been lucky enough to grab this week. We hope you enjoy the picture and wish wish everyone a great Thanksgiving!



The Black-Capped Chickadees are visiting more and more.


The are coming in bigger groups, too.


The Sharp-Shinned Hawks are still visiting frequently. We see signs of them, too. After one of their visits there are sometimes feeders laying on the ground (we assume this is because they are using their "bumping" technique).


The Cooper's Hawks still like to swing by, too.


Waiting ever so patiently for a bird to happen by.


The Pine Siskin numbers have dwarfed all the other finches we get, but there is still quite a few Lesser and American Goldfinches hanging around. The Lessers stay with us all year long!

Siskins and Lessers sharing a dinner table.


The Squirrel and the Scrub-Jay.

More Sharpies

Well, the trend continues. After mulling it over, talking with fellow birders and speaking with the Cornell Lab, we have decided to leave the feeders up. It was a tough decision, but I think the right one.

So, our yard is now an airport for RaptorAir. We really do enjoy watching the hawks and they don't have a high success rate. Studying their behavior is extremely interesting. We still get quite a few birds in the yard, just not quite in such high numbers.

Here are some more photos of the hawks and one of a Northern Flicker as he was escaping said hawks. Hope you enjoy.




The Flicker is extremely fast and agile when the presence of a hawk is detected.


The Sharp-Shinned Hawks just lets us walk all around the yard and watch them.


Here is one of their favorite watch-points. Can you see him?


Here is another good vantage point for the hawk. This shepherds hook is right in the middle of the yard so the Sharpies (this one is a juvenile) can see everything. They can even watch squirrels try to climb the hook while they are sitting on it.


The squirrels seem to know that the Sharpie doesn't want them. This squirrel sniffed around for 5 minutes, waiting for the hawk to fly off. As soon as the hawk was gone, the squirrel climbed right up and started eating. The hawks will fly from feeder to feeder trying to flush someone out into the open.


Sitting on a platform feeder...

or above a thistle feeder... you get the idea.

Right after I took this photo, the Sharpie (another juvenile) shot off the fence for a bathing Pine Siskin. The Siskin was too agile for him, though, and got away!

Sharp-Shinned Hawk

This Sharp-Shinned Hawk is a persistent little bugger! She has visited the yard on at least 4 separate occasions in the last 24 hours! It obviously makes for slow song bird watching but it's still a pretty awesome sight.

Now, there is almost always confusion when it comes to determining if it’s a Sharp-Shinned (Accipiter striatus) or a Cooper’s Hawk (Accipiter cooperii). You can follow this link http://www.birds.cornell.edu/pfw/AboutBirdsandFeeding/accipiterIDtable.htm and that will take you to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and their Hawk Identification page. It’s extremely helpful and it’s also a shameless plug for me (my photo is the first Cooper’s hawk on the right). This site will give you reliable and scientific ways to tell the 2 similar Hawks apart.

Now, would you like to hear about an unscientific way to tell?

So, there's a Hawk in your yard and you want to tell if it's a Sharp-Shinned or a Cooper's? Easiest way? Let them see you. Seriously. If the Hawk in question sees you and flies away, it's a Cooper's. If it stays put, it a Sharp-Shinned. I swear, that's how we are able to tell anymore. We don’t have to look at their size or their tail or their markings. We just let them see us. The Cooper's does NOT like people. The Sharp-Shinned could care less if we are in the yard when he is. The Sharpie will let us walk under him in the tree or move around in the yard while he sits on the fence. It's amazing. Every single time that the Cooper's has seen us come out into the yard, he is off like a shot. But not the Sharpie. Has anyone else noticed this or do we just have kooky Hawks?


I came out into the backyard yesterday and the first thing I notice is that there isn't a single bird in the yard, but I can hear a few Black-Capped Chickadees going nuts. Usually, when the Chickadees are doing their "chickadee-dee-dee-dee-dee-dee" we know there is a Hawk around. So, I started scanning the yard and, sure enough, right in from of me on the clothes line post sits a Hawk.


I zoom in with the camera (in shaking hands) and I see that she is staring right at me. She didn't flinch or fly away. She just sat there. This tells me (unscientifically) that this must be a Sharpie.


She then stretches her legs out and tucks one of them into her feathers.


Then, she just sits there and proceeds to scan the yard for prey.


As we were going through the photos, Michelle noticed and noted, that the Sharpie seems to be missing a talon. I believe that she is correct and we don't quite know what to make of it. Do they regrow their talons if one is lost? Does it make them less likely to survive?


Then this morning, I come out into (again) an empty yard. Just as I start to scan the land, she flies in and hits one of our feeders. I think she was trying to spook something out into the open. No success, so she flies up into the Mountain Ash and sits there, watching.


She turns around a few times to let me know that she sees me and also to let me know that she knows that, if I step out of line, she will kick my butt.


She continues to fly around the yard, bumping into feeders (I'm assuming that she's trying to flush something out) and then she comes to rest on one of our shepherd hooks.


She scans the yard for a while longer and then takes off like she was shot out of a cannon after a Flicker that was too close to the yard. I saw her fly by a few minutes later being chased by crows but she apparently wasn't successful in nabbing the Flicker as her talons were empty.