Garden

[Jacie]

I had a nice sighting yesterday! \

Spotted a tiny Brown Creeper working the bark of the 

crabapple tree. They are year round residents here, but really hard to spot in the summer.

They work opposite of the Nuthatches, they go up circling the tree vs. down!

A fun little bird!

[tototwo]

Why do we have robins?   They always fly to warmer climes in the fall, but this winter we have dozens of robins in our yard every day.  What's up with that?  It's cold here!

We keep our feeders full and try to keep water in the birdbaths, even tho it sometimes freezes.  We have oodles of goldfinches, purple finches (in their winter coats), juncos, cardinals........... and one lone flicker.

And robins.

[JustJazzmom]

---

@tototwo wrote:

Why do we have robins?   They always fly to warmer climes in the fall, but this winter we have dozens of robins in our yard every day.  What's up with that?  It's cold here!

We keep our feeders full and try to keep water in the birdbaths, even tho it sometimes freezes.  We have oodles of goldfinches, purple finches (in their winter coats), juncos, cardinals........... and one lone flicker.

And robins.

---

Robins contrary to popular lore do not migrate. Instead they go into a state of hibernation called torpor. You will see on the warmer days of winter them coming around and stirring. I like seeing them.

[tototwo]

Hey thanks, @JustJazzmom -- yes, I've always believed robins went south in the winter because we never saw them from Nov - March until this year.  In fact, when I was a kid, we used to spit in our palm to make a wish on the first robin we saw in the spring.... but I'm aging myself.   One of our bird books says robins migrate in the fall.  We've had several days below zero in Dec and early Jan.  We've only seen the robins when it's 30 degrees or above, so that makes sense.  Guess I need to do more research.

[jannabelle1]

We feed year-round too, but add suet in the winter. After all of our midwest (St. Louis) ice melted on Sunday and Monday, the bird baths are now full of water. Today we had large "flock" of robins that spent most of the day off and on those bird baths....fun to watch them. Mostly we see blue jays, cardinals, titmouse, sparrows, woodpeckers and nuthatches - and now robins. Squirrels love the feeders but since we also feed the deer from the woods behind us, the squirrels spend most of the days making a feast out of the corn in the big bin we keep filled beyond our patio. Yes - we do have some fat gray squirrels! They need to eat too!

[Jacie]

We have a warm front in my area, snow is melting like mad! I heard a cardinal singing a "spring" somg early yeaterday.

Last night I heard 2 Great Horned owls doing mating calls, one in the tree the birdfeeders are near! They are good to have in my area, keep the rodent populations in check!

[sktchy]

---

@Jacie wrote:

---

@brewhaha wrote:

No birds. The cat chases them away.

---

@brewhaha I have iendoor cats only and they are fascinated by the birdfeeder activity! I swear there are times they are begging to be let out to have at 'em!

---

We call the bird feeders cat feeders for a reason.

NOOO - we don't let the cats out - at least not unattended.

[JustJazzmom]

Turns out we have 3 nuthatches visiting the peanut feeder and suet feeder!

This morning I went to refill back the thistle seed feeder and a goldfinch was on it with its back to me. I was able to pet its back once before it took off! I wonder if it had some vision problem? Sometimes the finches can get a conjunctivitis in their eyes. 

Always wash your hands after filling any feeders. I do.