I sooo hate it when I mess up a Subject Title! Grrrrr ....

"I am so easiLy amused ...." dumb, dumb, dumb ......

The truth to the reason that I snatched up a tiny parcel of land that abuts mine (inner city Garner) - a third of an acre parcel with no street access, nothing but woods and weeds? TWO nesting pairs of Woodthrushes in it!!! They both made it back from the tropics this past weekend. They sing during the cooler parts of the day and spend the warmest parts hopping about looking for bugs and worms. They act like little robot birds in the way they will hop across the driveway to check out whatever you are doing. Too cute for words.

Otherwise - a few hummers, I usually get a nesting pair and they chase off any other hummers. The first in many successions of House Wrens (or are they Carolina Wrens??? I forgot) - they also nested in a hanging basket so I got up close and personal with the chicks on many a occassion. The neighbor has a bluebird box which is so full of chicks that when they all sing for their supper you can hear them from the front yard; and a pair of Red Shouldered Hawks which perch on the garden fence when I'm inside (they're great vole hunters!).

Definitely another bird-brain here! Gardening and birding just go hand in hand, I think. My first bluebird babies fledged today (sniff, sniff)--I LOVE watching how mom & dad just know what to do to raise their young. Also have hummingbirds, lots of the other regulars (cardinals, goldfinches, wrens, chickadees,titmice, catbirds, towhees, brown thrashers, blue jays, doves, woodies, can't remember what else), and was thrilled to see a rose-breasted grosbeak last weekend. I am easily amused, also, by those little miracles in life!

We love birds. Right now we have 2 nests in our 5 bluebird boxes- no blues yet, but a chickadee nest and a titmouse nest. The titmice are behind a rose so i can't peek at them, but the 'dees are in one of the boxes in the open and i've peeked in several times at momma on the nest (and she doesn't budge) and the babies by themselves (who promptly beg). They both sing loudly for their supper. Something enlarged the hole on one of our boxes, but nothing's nesting in it yet. We normally have a cardinal or 2 nesting somewhere close, though i haven't found the nest(s) yet this year.

I suspect mama wren has her clutch somewhere in or near our shed again- they usually nest in there somewhere- since i keep hearing the babies. She always finds the oddest place to put them. Somehow they keep getting into our porch greenhouse and even the house- they really like the porch. Little stinkers. My daughter reported that one was sitting next to one of our parrots the other day and he was really startled! She shooed it out of the house.

We have lots of hummers- to the point that one rarely comes to a feeder without dogfighting with another. Funny little guys. I grow lots of vines and things they like so they aren't bound to the feeders at all. I would absolutely love to find one of their nest s someday.

There's a broad-winged hawk that's been visiting our backyard several times a week for years now. Took us forever to correctly ID him. We also have a pair of barred owls that are nesting somewhere close. Since we've lived here there have almost always been some around because we hear them almost nightly from back near the swamp. One recent night they were right outside our bedroom window and were so loud it was amazing! They have a purr at the end of their calls - almost cat-like when you're close enough. Very eerie! We were very glad when they flew away because neither of us could have slept with that racket.

John, we always have a few woodthrush around and i love them, too. Their singing thrills me, second only to the blue's song. I also love watching, or rather hearing the rufous sided towhees tearing into the leaves looking for goodies- they make so much racket i always think it's a much bigger critter. A rare sight is to see a pair of pileated woodpeckers that come around once & again. We have lots of other woodpeckers- hairy, downy, ladderbacked and flickers. The silly little brownheaded nuthatches are funny when they come so close to us, cracking their seeds in the bark of the oak tree. Their twittering is unique. They are very tame. A super thrill is to see an oriole or indigo bunting.

So i guess we're bird geeks, too. Proud of it. :)

One of the first things I did when we moved into this house was put up a bird feeder. The back of our lot is wooded and the HOA puts up and maintains bluebird houses in the common areas around the walking trails so we have lots of visitors. We have a pair of wood thrushes living in the yard - I love it when they get up on the feeder. Being ground-feeders, they're kinda klutzy, but they persevere. The towhees are nearly tame. They seem to hang out a lot when I'm gardening. Maybe the weeding digs up something they like. The house wrens are in our little bird house for the second year. The dees got it first last year, and the wrens followed, but this year I think the wrens had it to themselves. A Carolina wren nested somewhere near the back deck and the fledglings spent their first week or so out of the nest in the hollies back there. They couldn't fly very well, but they could make it up into the low holly branches, and I'm pretty sure they all made it. The cardinals are nesting in the holly next to the side door, and I think there's another pair nesting in the bushes in the back yard. They nested both places last year. We have a red-shouldered hawk that hangs out in the back yard from time to time (I'm glad to hear that they eat voles - I've got a bunch of them). I even heard a screech owl one night. It's been years since I've heard that call, but it's very memorable. Yeah, I'm a bird geek too.

I have a life list, although I haven't updated it for a while. I got into bird watching when working at an ornithology lab at Duke. We used to go to Jordan Lake to see the bald eagles and saw a myriad of bird life there. Now I live where there is also a myriad of bird life, minus the bald eagles. We have wood ducks and prothonotary warblers in the sloughs, and blue grosbeaks, summer tanagers (in fact one that acted very tame), scarlet tanagers, indigo buntings, yellow throats, ovenbirds, woodcocks, barred owls, red-shouldered hawks, and hummingbirds everywhere else. Lots of crows, common and fish, making bizarre noises in the woods, lol. More warblers than you can shake a stick at.

Glad so many of us are bird brains, bird-iacs or whatever! The feathered ones truly complete a landscape. I'm not as good w/identifying them all, but am pretty sure I have most of all mentioned above. My lot backs up to a working farm and hawks can be seen circling most all the time (I had to be very careful when my beagle was a wee one, was afraid she'd be mistaken for lunch!). One came down into the yard and posed long enough for me to ID him/her - a red shouldered hawk.

My neighbors constantly comment on how much they enjoy "my" birds and the constant twitter/chirps/songs. I kept offering to share them and finally one neighbor did put out some feeders so I don't feel like I'm singlehandedly supporting the whole N.Raleigh bird populace anymore - the cost of seed was getting a little heavy!

Currently have three babies in the hanging fern and still three marble sized eggs in the cable box nest - I make a point of not disturbing either if at all possible. Such fun!

We've had a few "discussions" with Carolina wrens over the years. One year they tried to build a nest on the tractor engine. They are constantly building nests everywhere in the hay shelter -- I can't tell you how many times I've pulled nesting material out of my helmet. It appears overnight. They have successfully raised babies in there despite our constant comings and goings. The funniest was a dummy nest that a male built in our truck bumper (male Carolina wrens sleep in these nests at night). I drove the truck everywhere but the truck was parked in the same place every night, in time for the wren to check in for bedtime.

That is hysterical! The funniest place the wrens have picked for us was in a flexible dryer vent hose. It went from the dryer about 6' to a hole in our basement door, and so it moved every time you opened the door. It had gotten some tears towards the end and didn't get too hot and i guess the wrens thought it was the perfect spot. Since they already had eggs by the time we discovered it we let them have it. We'd knock on the door, momma would come out like a brown streak, we'd go in & do the laundry and close the door back up and she'd settle back down. Too funny. We had to evict them from the bike helmets a couple of times. Guess it's just the right size and shape. They even built one in a stack of pot trays i had sitting in our shelf. It was one of the kind that has round molded holes, and looked just the right size for them. I bought them their own wren house a few years back but do you think they've used it even once? Noooo.

We also get a kick out of the birds.

Last year we had a carolina wren try to build her next in the cover we have over the big umbrella on the patio. There's a little hollow created inside when you zip the thing closed. Luckily we found it before eggs were laid and removed it. As an alternate, they chose to build right next to the patio--in a small concrete fountain that had not yet been filled up with water. We had fun observing them as the busy parents kept on the go bringing bugs for the babies. We put up a wren house for them this year and it must have met with their approval because they're nesting in it.

This spring, a mourning dove apparently landed in one of our hanging baskets right near the front door and decided it was pretty comfy so she stayed. The chicks have hatched and boy are they big and, I'm sorry to say it, ugly.

Sadly, we don't have any bluebirds nesting in our boxes this year. (Last year there was a nest and eggs early in the season, but the mother bluebird disappeared before the eggs hatched. Although we continued to see the male bluebird at the feeder, we never saw the female again.)

Nest count here is increasing, with a bit of ID. Fern babies are Carolina Wrens, cable box eggs are House Wren and I just discovered another nest atop the fence woven into the akebia vines (no ID on them yet, but they're pretty big). Funny, my beagle had been 'worrying' over that section of fence for weeks, but I couldn't detect anything until last night. (reinforcing note to self: the beagle is never wrong!)

It makes me all warm and fuzzy feeling that despite my occasionally vocal beagle, the birds are so comfy here that they can overlook her and raise families! Just doin' my part :o)

There's mocker babies atop the Climbing Old Blush. We have done a lot of clearing around the house -- it used to be that mockingbirds never ventured this far into our "wilderness". To tell the truth I'm getting a little tired of all of the male mocker's hissing and threats -- shut up already, lol.

There's an indigo bunting singing over the old house site. We have a lot of wild blackberry bushes around and that's one of their favorite nesting sites.

The nest I mentioned above (woven into the akebia vines, atop the fence) actually contained two mourning dove chicks (twins!) and I got to watch Mom Dove fledge them into the big world - right outside the sunroom door! Very fun .......

Then, last night I discovered that Mom Dove likes the 'hood so well that she has two more eggs in the same nest! She's not as jittery as other birds - stands (sits) her ground on the nest while I peer in at her from less than 12" away! Today I wedged in a little dish of sunflower seeds so she can snack and keep the eggs warm at the same time.

Amazing to me is that there is at least 50+ lateral feet of fence/akebia vines in my yard, yet Mom Dove has chosen to nest closest to the people/beagle place - right outside the sunroom.

I'm getting a vicarious grandmotherly thrill here ... :o)

Zig- couple years ago my mom had an old bird feeder my grandad made- it was a really big one with a hole at either end and glass that kept the seed in (you filled it through the holes and it held a gallon or 2 of seed). Well, a dove decided it was just the place to nest when it got low, and so Mom got front row seat to watch the babies as they hatched and grew, since it was about 3' outside her LR window. I think the feeder finally fell apart in the last year or 2. It had been used for probably 40-50 years!

I too love watching the birds and wildlife around the house and garden. They are already building nests in the rafters of the new garden shed. However I did get a bit of a shocker this weekend. I hadn't used my grill since last summer, it's old and deterioriating. I'm waiting to get the deck built then I'm going to put in a really nice one in an outdoor kitchen design. But I decided since it was a holiday weekend, to fire the old one up one more time. I went out raised the lid to be suprised by a Mom Bluebird who had laid 3 beautiful eggs in a nest she had made in my old grill!! So I quietly closed the lid and came inside and hit the Home Depot website to find a temporary grill for this year. Who knows, after she hatches the babies, maybe I'll take the tank off this one and make it a Bluebird house. This was the last year for it anyway. LOL

Our gardens are grown primarily for birds and butterflies - our enjoyment of seeing the flowers is a by-product. Last year we invested in a really nice birdfeeding station from Wild Birds Unlimited because we were tired of feeding the squirrels. We do however enjoy the squirrel antics high up in the pine trees - jumping from tree to tree. We are on our second brood of bluebirds, jays have a nest built high up in a pine tree, the cardinals are nesting in our back woods, flycatchers are nesting in the martin house. The last two years we have found hummingbird nests after the fact - have never actually caught them nesting. We have all the usual song birds at the feeders all the time, pilated woodpecker made his first appearance yesterday, owls have been back in the woods, the whipperwill has been in the area. The better part of our day is spent watching and listening. There is nothing I enjoy more than seeing the yellow finches getting seed from dead flower heads or the swallowtail cats munching at the dill and parsley. I guess you could say we are big birders here and yep easily amused - nature at its best right in our back yard.....

Lynne

DS1 (grown up) thought I was crazy talking to the birds in the garden. Well, I've noticed that when he's home and helping me in the garden, he talks to them, too! The goldfinch, chickadees and even a pair of mockingbirds are regulars when I'm in the garden. LOL

We had a sad casualty, though. The same male hummingbird comes by every morning during our coffee time and preens in our willow tree while he decides the daily menu. He didn't show up yesterday. My DH and I were out gardening later yesterday and found a male hummingbird (deceased) that looked to be caught up in a spider web. We suppose it's our little buddy. We were relieved to see the female among the salvia this morning.

Update - two new dove babies in the akebia vine nest. Mom & chicks are doing well :o) !

Helpful hint for this torridly hot weather (all summer, actually) - dump a bowl of ice cubes into bird baths once or twice a day. Cools & flushes the bath - my birds love it!

I too feel priviledged to observe our nesting birds. We have 2 GARDINIA BUSHES outside our bedrooms windows (heavenly smell). The CARDINALS love it and use one bush or the other every year. The WRENS are very strange about nesting locations. I've had them in a WATERING CAN that hangs from a hook several years, then this year she built her nest under a PLASTIC WHITE BOWL I'd turned upside down to avoid standing water, it's on the top shelf of my potting shed. I almost picked it up until I saw "stuff" sticking out the side! In both locations we can hear the babies wailing for their food. I keep a small bird ID book outside in my garden bag.
So, yes, gardeners are natural bird lovers.

I'm so glad to see so many birders here on the forum. I have a yellow bird with black wings in my gardens. He kinda looks like a goldfinch on steroids except no black cap. He's about the size of a cardinal. I've seen him twice and every time I go for my camera...he's gone! Beautiful bird but don't have a clue what he is!
Anyone know???
Thanks
Evelyn

Sounds like an immature male Tanager, or female Orchard Oriole. Could also be a late-migrating female Baltimore Oriole. Or an Evening Grosbeak way out of his range.

I did a google search under images and found a Eurasian Golden Oriole that looks just like him but they are not native here. I hope that I can get a closeup pic of him.
Thanks Alicia

Update on our birding activity - two weeks ago my wonderful husband installed a hummingbird feeder on my mothers bedroom window - she is pretty much bedridden and under hospice care now. We had already moved her bed around in her bedroom so she would have a full unobstructed view of the backyard and the birdfeeder station I mentioned earlier in this post. Well....that hummingbird feeder has given her so many hours of entertainment and she is not at all shy about letting us know when it is empty. She has stories to tell all the hospice home care nurses when they come about all the bird activity - this the view out her window of a hummingbird at the feeder
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this is her overall view out the window
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Lynne

That's wonderful Lynne, and I'm sure a great source of comfort for your Mom. Beautiful yard.

Lynn I bet your mother does enjoy the hummingbird feeder -- those birds are so entertaining to watch. She has a lovely view of your garden.

That is wonderful Lynn that you have her room set up so she can enjoy the birds and yard!! When my dear FIL was in a home the end of last year before he passed, the home had feeders all around so everyone could enjoy. It was a source of enjoyment for him and I often walked thru the halls to see other residents enjoying the feeders. Your yard and garden is beautiful.

Thank you everyone - We saw such a change in her whole disposition when we changed the room around - before she just kinda stared off into blank space - now she is engaged and animated and eager to tell us what is going on and asks questions about what is blooming, ect. It has been as much fun for us as it has been for her.......

Lynne