Attracting birds to feeders, aka illustrating the foodchain

The new feeder model seems to be settling in and accepted. There are often 4-5 goldfinches between the two feeders and the new one being well used. A dove has learnt to feed from it if it is left too close to the railing. One Goldfinch is particularly recognizable with several white feathers on crown.
Still impressive numbers of house finches coming to feed with 4-6 often around. The sparrow mafia frequently rolls in with up to
18 birds. One female house finch was defending her feeding patch aggressive from the sparrows with some success today. The female Sparrow with white middle left tertial remains a frequent visitor.
There are more Carolina Chickadees than I remember last winter, , often three at once with four just now. A Carolina Wren and WB Nuthatch also visited today
All this activity is, I am sure, encouraging the almost daily visit from a Cooper's. Today again an adult (female?) visited; spooked everything by arriving from the left today. It rested for a few seconds and then returned in a minute or so to sit, less conspicuously, in the tree for a bit.

The other 7am

First time since the tine change and of course I'm now an hour behind everything. A pleasant calm day probably resulted in successful early feeding and relatively slow birding by the time I arrived.
Nothing on the pond but 2 female-type Hooded Merganser upstream from cardinal bridge.
On the slope down to the riverbed I watched a red fox settle down to sleep in the sun but that meant that my Ruby-crowned Kinglets and Yellow-rump moved up the hill




Near the dog park a small group of sparrows included a chipping sparrow which was much less co-operative than this Junco, the former hiding away at the top of a tree while I tried to turn it into something more exotic with no luck...

Wren taxonomy

Here's the scooby on the Winter Wren complex taxonomy per IOC

ENGLISH NAME UPDATES - IOC Version 2.5 (July 4, 2010)

Eurasian Wren Troglodytes troglodytes
(Change English name to Eurasian Wren follows split of North American "Winter Wrens"'; BOU choice?)

Winter Wren

Troglodytes troglodytes

Eurasian Wren

Follows split of NA Troglodytes spp

ENGLISH NAME UPDATES - IOC Version 2.6 (Oct 23, 2010)

Winter Wren Troglodytes hiemalis

	Eastern Winter Wren	Troglodytes hiemalis	Winter Wren	Follow NACC reversal to simpler traditional name, IOC's original recommendation

Pacific Wren Troglodytes pacificus

Western Winter Wren	Troglodytes pacificus	Pacific Wren	Follow NACC reversal to simpler new name, IOC's original recommendation

Occoquan 11/07/10

A decidedly chilly start to Sunday morning found Chrystal and I at Occoquan NWR for a local Audubon walk led by Rich Reiger and helped by Kurt Gasklil.



While we waited for the group to assemble, we saw the only Waxwings of the day, a flock of 30+ birds over towards the Ringing station. By the time we got around there, they were nowhere to be seen however. Good numbers of bluebirds were around, maybe a flock of 40 to start with and several others around the reserve. Also in good numbers, Kinglets, and unusually Golden-crowed out numbered Ruby-crowns, with maybe15 of the former and 4-5 of the latter seen during the morning



Out in the bay huge flocks of Gadwall and Coot predominated - maybe a 1000 of the duck (including later flyover flocks of a couple of hundred) and 600 Coot. Pied-billed Grebe were plentiful with maybe 30 seen, undoubtedly there were more.

In one of the streams leading down to the bay a fine Rusty Blackbird was feeding less than 30 feet away, a excellent look at a species that is often hard to see this well.







A couple of Palm Warbler were found along the 'shore' but no sign of the Orange-crowned Warbler photographed by another birder coming up from the point.

Palm and Fish

Pre-Dawn, the crows were flying away from
roost in dispersed flocks. All the larger groups seemed to be almost exclusively Fish Crow with American crows in ones and twos.
On the lake 5 and then later 6 Hooded Merganser Inc 2 males where less active than the other morning - perhaps they display actively when they first arrive on site?
Passerines were pretty quiet until I found a small party in tree along the rail-track just past the Magic Spot. A skulking, but ultimately well seen, yellow Palm Warbler was in a small group of ruby-crowned kinglets and a yellow-rumped warbler. The warblers flew over to the stream-side trees, leaving the Kinglets.

New visitors

A new, noticeably marked Male house sparrow with white left wing primary and right wing secondary was feeding this afternoon. I wonder how many new birds arrive unnoticed.

Pine siskin :)




Not all together unexpwcted considering there are a lot around right, nwver the less a welcome visitor to the nyger feeders from late afternoon pretty easy to pick out :
Colder darker brown
Much smaller than house finch
Crisper clear wing bar and tertial/ secondary edging and all together more contrasting
Very suble greenish edges to primary edges up towards the coverts
Very thin and subtle supercilium behind eye
Pale border to dark ear coverts and 'face'
Fine black bill


The new feeder seems to be bedding in. Not on was it visited by this bird, it had a max of 5 goldfinch today. Also several House Finch and the occasional Sparrow :(.

(In)activity at the feeders

The new Nyger feeder seems to taking time o adjust to with only a Goldfinch and a House Finch seen so far. The old feeder is much more frequently used.

We seem to have a couple of female House Finch with the eye disease. One female has a fully closed eye and another has some disturbed feathering and a swollen partially closed eye (both right eyes I think from memory).

Brrrrrr....

In the lake seven Hooded Merganser were found in the light mist over the lake at dawn. As the sun came up 2 of the 3 males were displaying frantically to 1 or 2 of the females. No sign or the grebe or Bufflehead of a couple if days ago.



Only a light crow passage from roost this Mir ing despite being early. Most looked like fish crows and the majority that called were. Later I found a party sitting in trees above the riverbed, one looked bigger and there were certainly odd American Crow still.

A few flocks of 20-25 Robin flew over high and smaller parties were in the trees around the picnic area.

Slow day, mad day

As shown, sometimes even the sparrow and finch chaos subsides and the feeder becomes a perch.

30 mins or so later, Doves, sparrow, finches and Cardinals EXPLODE in all directions as an adult Coopers pays a visit to it's feeding station. This bird was a little smaller than the juvenile that visited the other day but nicely barred rufous.

Twitching Alexandria

Checking the Birdseye iPhone app on Saturday we saw that a nearby park had Red-breasted Nuthatch reported. Neither of us knew of Chinquapin Park but on Sunday we found it just behind TC Williams HS. It was towards midday so very quiet but the stream looks a great area for migrants in the Spring (if it has water!) . The other side of the park, we found some Pines and after a little playing of Nuthatch "Toot"s soon has at least three birds calling, seeing two birds easily. Probaly female or young birds, they were pale orange underparts. They were reluctant to come down out of the Pines, feeding actively.

Returning to the car we heard one nearby (possibly one of the three) and another maybe 1/4 mile away.

The first frost

A frosty morning at the park for the first time this season and, perhaps not surprisingly all the bees have moved from the still flowering plants.



Oddly no Mallard or Geese were seen to day and the long staying Hooded Merganser seems to have a new companion in the shape of an eclipse or young male Bufflehead. I judged to be a young/eclipse male by the white breast and grey side although it had a full female type head.







Down at the riverbed a pair of Killdeer were flushed and flew off towards Pooh Bridge. A male Belted Kingfisher noisily fed around the area where the two streams join. The weedy area contained a lot of birds, mostly Goldfinch but also Yellow-Rumps, Ruby-crowned Kinglet and the first of two Phoebe



Just past the Magic Spot a juvenile Sapsucker was watched. The black pectoral band becoming well developed but no red is showing on the head yet.

Crow moult

Update on crow moulting from the very interesting Cornell site, contra Pyles


Fish and American Crow

"American Crows molt earlier than Fish Crows. During the summer the two species can be distinguished by their stages of molt. In much of their range American Crows breed a month or more earlier than Fish Crows (Johnston 1961, The biosystematics of American crows, Univ. of Washington Press; Clapp and Banks 1993, Raven 64: 90-98; McGowan 2001, Fish Crow (Corvus ossifragus) in Birds of North America, No. 589). In upstate New York American Crows start incubation the first week of April, while Fish Crows don't start until May. Most birds do not molt until they are finished breeding, and the molting schedules of the two crows reflect the month difference in their breeding schedule. The earliest Ithaca American Crows (non-breeders and those whose nests have failed) will start molting in June and will be finished by the end of September. Ithaca Fish Crows, on the otherhand, start molting in late July and don't finish until October."
"

A quiet Riverbend

Not much happening with birds or people today. The 'new' entrance to the visitors centre gives a good reflection in early afternoon leading to a femLe Cardinal attacking her reflection for about an hour in short spells.

Crowwatch - or not, 10/29/10

It’s COLD out here! 52 per the Weather Channel but brrr

17:59 few crows low over houses mainly Am, one/two Fi calling, circling
18:00 all quiet, few birds calling in mid-distance
:04 C.Chickadee wanting to come down but too scared...
:07 nothing substantial yet, a Fi calling out in the distance somewhere
:14 suddenly a cacophony from about 20 Am. (and 1 Fi!) in the trees to the left of the deck - raptor? - i dont see anything

:19 well it looks like no crow streams tonight, i wonder why? its been windy but not too bad, its been cooler but not too cold and there’s obviously some crows around, a puzzler

:24 all quiet apart from the occasional distant Am.

:25 Signing out,,,,

Lively afternnon on the deck

Busy afternoon on the feeders. Mostly sparrows but 3 or more Chickadee,a Cardinal, Downy on the fat, House Finches and the first Junco sighting for the season, a Song Sparrow also joined

More Crows

This morning there were 500+ crows circling over Sanger. Ave junction with Van Dorm just at dawn.

Tonight there is an amazing stream of American and Fish Crow over the community here at Hillwood. They are low, barely roof height and must have been coming over at 50-100 / minute for 15 minutes. Vast majority of the latter birds seem to have been Fish Crow

I've just taken a video of a minute or so of passage and the following is a frame from that.

537 crows in 1min 28! Even if we conservatively half that, that's about 3000 birds in 15 mins

Just because I'm smaller than you...

Pretty quiet couple of days at the feeders, heavy rain yesterday morning and I was mostly absent.

A couple of Goldfinch has started to appear at the Nyger feeder. Unlike the other species they tend to just sit quietly and eat while others bounce all around them.
Fewer House Finches seen today.

Late in the day, a White-breasted Nuthatch   fed at the large feeder (combination of small seed and Nyger). It was distributing seeds all over the place as it picked through the different seeds until it found a suitable one (whatever criteria that was). At one point a Mourning Dove was on the rail above it and it started some strange posturing, swaying from side-to-side,  with partially open wings

A balmy October day....

Average high temp for today 64, pre-Dawn actual 61, can't imagine going for a pre-breakfast walk on Scilly just in a teeshirt despite my record of being there with high pressure in October.
Further field testing of differentiating the crows was pretty successful this morning with again the Fish crow mainly being later than the American Crow. No wing moult noticed today.
From Cardinal Bridge I watched two pairs of Mallard diving apparently for food. Like Scoter they open there wings and flapped to give Initial subversive power and then paddled like crazy to stay under while they reach the stream-bed.
Each dive was usually 3-5 seconds and each bird when they surfaced had drooped wings and, unless they dived again quickly, frantically rearranged they plumage with flapping and preening.
Two Great Egret flew in over Pooh Bridge later, previously these had only been early birds.

Blue Jay visit

At the feeders today the female House Sparrow with the White tertial remains with the usual flock. A brief visit from a Blue Jay was unusual, but it was nervy and flew off after a quick drink.

The very bright red male house finch remains with 6 or so others mostly female or dull males.

Crows, mobbing and caterpillars

Crows at dawn

Arriving before dawn broke I witnessed the return of some of the Crows seen going to roost the other evening. There must of been over 500 this morning, rather more dispersed than the flocks going to roost. I'm determined to master the ID of crows by sight and with the help; of Sibley I think I am getting there. Pretty sure that one flock of 105 were all Fish Crow, some were calling but all seemed to have relatively more pointed wings, small heads and marginally longer tails. It's not easy to read these feautres on all birds though.
Only birds in this group of fish group showed primary moult (some extensive) is there a timing difference between the spp?

*update - Pyles says both species moult July-September *


One suspect American was later seen with minor secondary moult however.












On the lake I initially only found the Merganser but later found the Grebe, on the opposite side.

Lots of House and Goldfinchs around today, a group of the latter feeding on the riverside weeds were watched from the riverbed.
When returning up the hill from the river, a mobbing group of birds were found. I never did find their target, maybe a screech-owl, The party consisted of several Cardinals, Chickadees, Downy Woodpecker and a Catbird (a species not seen for several days), and a Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Blue Jays were on the periphery. It was an impressive and pretty aggressive display.

On the grass area near the picnic shelter a big furry caterpillar was found. First thoughts were a 'Woolly Bear' but there were only thin rings of color. I believe this is actually a Giant Leopard Moth or Eyed Tiger Moth (Hypercompe scribonia)

Save Now

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Between the dog park and the Magic Spot a bunch of activity including 4-5 Juncos and 10 or so Yellow-rumped Warblers.

The bees were asleep as expected!

End of feederwatch for a while...

16:03 I'd been watching the feeders on the deck for a while this afternoon and was just starting an article on differentiating American and Fish crows when this HUGE thing landed on the small table. I slowly looked up so as not to spook it and found a juvenile Cooper's Hawk about 12 feet away. It looked around , hopped up on the railing and then, after a brief visit next door was off.

I'm guessing we won't see any Dives for a while but a squirrel and Chickadee were back within 6 minutes

Into new territory

A rather wonderful upper 60s walk in Ben Brenman park and then under Duke Street and up Holmes Run.
The Grebe and merganser were out in the open water near the overflow when we arrived and when we returned from our walk.
There was a lot more bee activity today in the warm morning sun with numerous insects flying and more feeding actively. There were still a couple in a sedentary state however.
Over Cardinal Bridge, we turned left and headed upstream. Just after the small playground there is a shaded stream crossed by another bridge (instantly named Troll Bridge :) ) that looks as if it could be marvellous for migrant warblers in spring.
We walked up the the very significant bridge across to N.Pickett Street. From the bridge a Coopers hawk flew down stream. The path was quite busy by mid-morning so there were few birds. I pished a yellow-rump down close and a small pool beside the river flow had a mix a bathing Robins, Cardinal and a Chipping Sparrow. These pools could also be interesting in the spring.

The birds.... The birds

The happy couple were on the pond, near the causeway to the pagoda this time.


There was some activity on the bee flowers but still several sleeping despite the rather nice temperature well before dusk, perhaps this will be these (apparently carpenter) bees last resting place?


At dusk - or just before - the crows started coming over roughly the magic spot and heading NE. I counted the first 400 and then occasionally 50 or 100 more until it seemed to run out just after the sun went down after at-least 1700 birds and probably more.Hitchcock would have been proud! There was a strange lack of calling with just a few American )earlier) and Fish ( later) calling. Either they were pretty well segregated or it is not as easy as I would like to believe to tell them apart (relatively speaking of course!)

Deck birds, the season begins

I've been watching the deck for the last couple of days after putting the first food of the autumn out.

Nothing too unusual but good number of House Finch (6-8 at a time). I am trying to study Carolina Chicadee but even in this relatively captured environment they are darn fast! A White-breasted Nuthatch and Carolina Wren ass some variety, and the marauding horde of House Sparrows include a female with a white middle tertial on her left wing.
The fat block had attracted a downy (or 2), chickadees, sparrows and occasionally an ambitious (or forgetful) squirrel will take a bite of the chili flavoured suet