I have a let the back ten feet of my property go wild. It a dense hedge of trees and bushes. Have a couple of cedar trees and an oak tree. Have other minor treelings. The list of birds I have seen regularly are robins, blue jays, mockingbirds, wrens, cardinals, and Hummingbirds. Other birds that visit are crows, cowbirds, and a great horned owl who considers my backyard it's territory. But it would be fun to get a complete list of avian visitors.

Thanks for the link.

Elia

We've got two acres of woods & I know there are all sorts of bird out there, but they're almost impossible to see 60 or 70 feet up in the tree tops. Now if I could ID them from their songs, I'd be in great shape.

Thanks for the reminder, Suzy. I signed up DH some time ago...he can see our main feeding station from his living room chair and he gives me a running commentary and bird count daily...LOL But it's nice to see his interest and to turn over feeder and birdbath care to him after so many years...he'll put suet cakes on my grocery list...specifying the exact type! Seems he (and the birds) like nuts sometimes but other times dried fruit! LOL

Elia, I'm jealous of your great horned owl. We too have a big sunny lot surrounded with a wooded edge and so we get a good assortment...but no owls that I'm aware of. josh

Hi Suzy,
I'm so glad to see you are still at the Garden Party.
theo

Yeah!!!! Theo, welcome home and I've missed you. Me, not at the party? LOL. I'm like a bad penny.

Jo, that is sort of what happened at my house. It seems like the things I share with my hubby, or teach him at, he usually excels in and surpasses me. He did that with embroidery first. I taught him how to do counted cross stitch and it turned into a decade long hobby with work more intricate than I'd ever dream of touching. Likewise the bird watching. He is very astute at noticing those minute markings one usually overlooks when describing common-looking species like sparrows. Because of this diligence, we have been able to document and photograph some rare sightings when ten years ago, alls we would have known was they were sparrows.

We do counts daily and keep logs on them. I do the transcribing, but he does the bones of the work, keeps the feeders filled, and like your husband is very specific about what goes in them. It is correct the suet preference can change because the species change who prefer suet and some lean toward nuts and some toward fruit and it's a time and season sensitive thing.

Suzy, your DH's cross-stitch reminded me of seeing a footballer, Rosie Greer, years ago on some talk show. He said he loved doing needlework on long plane trips. When asked if he wasn't often teased about doing "women's work", he just laughed...of course he was about 6 feet tall and wide...there was no likelihood anyone was going to tease him...he was a good sport about it.

DH did help me finish an overly ambitious Rya rug back in the sixties, but it wasn't as difficult or intricate as cross-stitch, just time consuming and as always, I had another project I wanted to start on. I think I still have a roll of canvas and the little hooking device...you might have sparked a new project here...LOL josh

Suzy, remember my butterfly house?
theo

Theo, I remember your posts from long ago but not the butterfly house. Could you update us? I am just starting to really "see" and appreciate butterflies since moving to a sunnier garden and growing more flowers rather than my beloved foliage plants. A butterfly house intrigues me...josh