Nice pic, Jane, of a self-satisfied weather forecaster. I also have a lot of juncos here now, and they've been feeding most of the day as I keep shoveling out their groundfeeding areas. Lots of birds checking in, including a red-breasted nuthatch, a Carolina wren and a hairy woodpecker all at the suet feeders.

This is what they're forecasting now.

Luckily the snow is fluffy and easy to shovel - somehow shoveling to feed the birds is a lot more satisfying than shoveling to clear the driveway for the cars.

Claire

I've finished shoveling for now after the snowstorm - I'll go back out again later. The Boston Globe says 17 inches total for Plymouth; there are a lot of drifts here but 12 to 17 inches is reasonable. Still light and fluffy so not to bad to shovel.

My first priority, of course, was to clear feeding space for the birds this morning, and all have been eating industriously.

Blue Jays grabbing peanuts in the shell on the day after a big snowstorm. Some of them are picky about which shell they take - I think they may be weighing them to choose the best package.

They're forecasting warm temperatures for Tuesday and four straight days of warmth with maybe some rain, so all of this snow stuff is going to melt away. I just hope it's gone before it turns cold again and ices up.

Claire

That's twice the amount we got. Have you thought about a small snowblower?

Now that you've finished, and the blue jays are happy, he's back.

I love that picture and the caption!

Which reminds me of this:

I'm doing a share of a snowblower with my brother next door, but that will only be for the driveway. I don't think I can use a small snowblower on my paths and birdfeeder areas since much of the surface is gravel or mulch, which gets airborne easily with unpleasant results. The paths are narrow and easy to shovel and I can always just stomp them into something passable.

Claire

Claire, I also love watching the Blue Jays go after and select just the right peanut. Obviously they are looking for ones that are most bountiful. Every morning they wait in the tree next door for us to go out and throw peanuts. Sometimes, if we're tardy, they land on the deck railings to protest.

Jane, love the frozen berries in the background of your picture!

We didn't get the snow that those of you farther south did. I'm glad to see that you all (particularly Claire with that 1 1/2' predicted) made it through just fine. We just got dustings the last two days totalling less than an inch, but with the cold weather and on top of the icy crust that was already there, it made for fast skiing in the woods yesterday. Too cold and windy to ski in the field along the river.

Last night as I was heading for bed, by the light of the moon and its snowy reflection I saw something moving in the field and stopped to watch through the window. A fox had come to visit the compost where I'd earlier in the evening dumped apple peals and a few meat scraps. I was able to watch (bright enough to use large binocs successfully) for quite a while as s/he jumped up onto the pile several times to bring food down onto the snow to eat. I don't know why s/he didn't just park himself on the pile where s/he was much less visible vs. against the smooth white snow. What a treat for me (and I suppose for him/her as well.)

Hopes, aspirations, dreams, longings, all dashed by size, reach and abilities. It happens in every life form. This little guy may live under the deck. He tugs at my heart, so out the window, I toss apple cores, pears, the crispy ends of apple turnovers, anything he may fancy. The stuff I toss is always gone by morning. Including the carcasses of those 'off the rack' store roasted chickens. That goes out front where there is no trail cam, but has lots of 4 footed traffic. I have very little garbage, and lots of yard friends.

Imagine looking at a feeder full of seed and you can't get there.

He resorts to the reachable stuff.

Jane

Love your possum, Jane.

I'd stick with apples and other edibles but forego the chicken carcasses. Cooked bones can and often do splinter in the intestines of dogs and cats, causing painful death (which is why they are on the forbidden list for pet owners) so it is unlikely that they are any safer in the digestive systems of other animals. Also a cat or dog wandering into your yard could find those bones, or even your own beautiful kitty, Ivy, with bad results.

Valid reasoning, Sped. :)

I swear I see eyelashes on the titmouse when photo is clicked to enlarge it.

Tail prop unnecessary

Got chicken?

Jane, I love these photos. When winter becomes frigid and filled with gray tones, it's great these color up the world with the reds and blues and oranges and pinks (as in the tip of a squirrel's tongue) of the animal world.

This morning as the sun came up I noticed the seals were already on the rocks. Apparently they normally sleep vertically in the water, reference: Harbor Seals sleeping, but maybe they keep waking up and check the tide to see if their favorite hauling out rocks are exposed.

I think there also was a seal on the other rock to the right, but I couldn't get a photo with the tree branch in the way.

Claire

Seals? You lucky duck! And the sun came up? Location, location, location. How far away from your property are they?

I can't really judge the distance - it's at the very limit of my 30X zoom and barely visible from the windows with my naked eyes (well, eyes with corrective glasses on) - several hundred yards, maybe?

I did take a video to try to show how it looked from the house but I need to process it a little before I can post it - maybe tomorrow.

Another mobile feature, a lot closer to my house, is a bald-headed male cardinal with a deformed bill that I've seen twice so far. The baldness may be just a molting issue but the bill really does look unnatural. I've submitted the pictures to PFW so I'll wait to see what they say.

Claire

Oh, precious bird, stay warm and well. Please let us know what PFW says, Claire.

Claire, the colors in the water of the seal photos are beautiful. Can you hear the seals as well as see them? I never knew how they slept.

Your poor cardinal really does look sad. I wonder if hulled seeds would help him out since I can't imagine that he can do too much with that beak.

I know that rodent teeth keep growing, and if misaligned so they don't wear against each other, will get too long. I wonder if the same holds true for birds' beaks. I will also be interested in what Cornell has to say.

Wow Claire, jealous of the water view with seals! That is one sad looking cardinal, though. Poor guy. :(

NHBabs: I can hear the seals! They don't always make noise, but they sometime growl and grumble, probably fighting over who gets the prime position on the favorite rock. I haven't been outside with my camera at the right time to capture it (yet).

This is the video I took to try to show how far away the seals are. I'm shooting from inside my house - the rock is in the center of the view and I zoom in on it. I had to switch to photo mode to get a focused image, as posted above, because the camera kept jumping to the branches.

I saw the cardinal feeding on the ground this morning and he seemed to be eating OK. Lately I've been using a wide variety of seed mixes, some of which have sunflower chips, fruit and nuts, so I don't know what he's eating. He seems to be in reasonably good condition except for the head which is probably cold when the temperatures are low. I haven't heard from PFW yet.

Claire

I usually think of hawks divebombing from the heights onto an unsuspecting small bird, but sometimes they skulk around like feathered tigers looking for their prey. I saw an adult Cooper's hawk acting like this today. I'm guessing it's a male since it's smaller than other Cooper's hawks I've seen here.

The alarm had probably already gone out since I didn't see any small birds except for one feckless titmouse that didn't stay very long.

Claire

Claire, I am a bit surprised at the skulking. I would have thought that this rather negated the advantage of speed that a dive gives, but perhaps he was on the ground after a dive. Perhaps he is hoping for someone with an injured wing or other mobility impairment. I imagine that in warmer weather he might stir up a few edible insects.

I love what I learn on these threads!

NHBabs: It may be partly an artifact of how my garden is set up. I have a lot of dense shrubs and grasses that small birds like to hide in and the hawks have probably noticed.

A few years ago I saw a hawk on the ground circling around a large ornamental grass and sticking its talons into the center of the grass. I think a small bird had taken refuge in there and the hawk couldn't quite reach it. I also once heard loud frantic chirping from a rose thicket and, when I went over to see what was going on, a hawk flew away leaving a small flock of sparrows unharmed. The hawk had them surrounded.

I've noticed that small birds will stay absolutely motionless when they're perched somewhere and a hawk suddenly shows up and they can't safely fly off. If the hawk doesn't see them they're safe, but if they move and are just within reach they may be caught.

Claire

The same thing (hawk vs. songbirds) happens here and it is because of the way I intentionally planted. It usually works in behalf of the songbirds

Okay. This chap's coloring is throwing me off. Wing markings look like Am.Goldfinch, coloring not so much - even female winter coloring. I've checked buntings - all varieties - and have successfully confused myself despite not seeking a government job. Not going to bug PFW with this.

Straight out of the camera: no hint of yellow anywhere

Lightened this picture to show more detail:

This suggestion from my DH: could it be a Purple House Finch because it has more red than yellow?

I don't know what your bird is, Jane - maybe post on the Bird Watching Forum?

Claire

This morning's breakfast crowd ...

Nice to see RW blackbirds. I usually think of them arriving in February and an early sign of spring.

Pretty picture, Molie. The red-wings and the parakeets add nice accents and the doves just blend in with the winter landscape.

I've had red-wings all winter (if you can call this winter - we've had about 5 wintry days so far). Yesterday, after the nor-easter was winding down, I had a flock of around 50 red-wings feeding on the ground. It was a PFW count day and the number woke up the data entry program..hee-hee... CONFIRM! CONFIRM!

Claire

Somehow, Jane, your mystery bird makes me think junco, just a funny colored junco.

Claire

Attractive visitor in the walnut tree today. Resembles the red-shouldered hawk that you all helped me identify a couple of years ago.

Wish I had been quick enough to catch it flying away...

Susan

Owls, anyone? We occasionally hear what I think is a Great Horned Owl along the river but have never seen them.

I've only seen one owl in my long life ... a wonderful accident. This was over 25 years ago when I lived in another community in a house in the woods. As my young son and I were bringing groceries into the house, a beautiful, brown and white and tan owl swept down and across us and then into the woods. He was just a few feet away and seemed to have swooped deliberately close. We put the groceries down and tried to find him in the woods. Impossible.

Lucky you! I heard Great Horned Owls once a few years ago. It sounded like two of them hooting to each other, but I've never seen one.

Claire

For almost 42 years I've heard barred owls contact each other outside my window, but I've never seen one - alive. A friend took me to a place in the woods to see 'the' owl she had seen perched and staring at her on her daily walk and when we got there, he'd fallen out of the tree dead. I would really like to see one a bit livelier.

Too many pictures probably, but this happened this afternoon outside my window:

Trying to get a seed inside the bud. He tried many times.

What?

Then my phone rang.

I knew he couldn't do it.

All-the-while, somebody else was watching to see if that seed was stored.

There's always sumthin'...

Jane

We have two kinds of owls that I am aware of, great horned and barred. We see the barred owls periodically, but almost never the great horned. We hear them both fairly regularly, especially at this time of year when they are starting their breeding season. I can do a passible barred owl imitation ("who cooks for you, who cooks for you-all" and sometimes just the last "you-all" repeated) and sometimes they will respond. I find the great horned owl a lot less easy to remember a pattern for and impossible to repeat. I've never seen or heard a saw-whet or screech owl in the wild.

Jane, it's sad that you could comment "yes" for an owl sighting. I wonder what happened to the one you saw.

NHBabs, no apology for the pic of the owl taken by your phone. Did you hear it before you saw it?

From the limited reading I've done, it seems that the Great Horned Owl does attack Blue Herons and their nests. There are Blue Herons on our river and perhaps these could possible attract the owl. I know there are many battles that occur along our river in the night... screeches and screams that wake us up, especially our dog, because even in the winter we sleep with a window open.

Herons vs great-horned owls - my goodness what a thought! They are both such large, strong birds that I just can't imagine. I often think of GH owls in terms of skunks since either dead (I worked for a museum taxidermist for a short stint and turned donations of dead birds into study skins for scientists) or alive every single one I ever handled smelled like skunk. Guess they don't have a sense of smell.

I can't take credit for that owl photo - dh took the photo of the owl which had chosen to perch along the edge of the yarding area where he turns trees into our winter fuel. It remained in place despite various pieces of equipment running within 50 feet. It hasn't chosen that perch since, however. We do see them a couple of times a year, in the woods or once even perched on the wires along the road looking for critters. DH says they (and broadwing hawks) sometimes bank off the wind created by his truck as he travels down the drive above the stream; they've learned that sometimes small rodents are flushed by the vehicle, so it has the potential for an easy meal.

One of my neighbors has planted a row of evergreens, now a bit over head high, along a roadside fence line. Today as I was passing I saw a sudden flurry of small birds zipping into the shelter of the evergreens and what I am fairly certain was a sharp-shinned hawk who was trying to bank sharply enough to catch one of them. Since I was passing in the car I didn't have the opportunity to see if the little birds all made it to safety or the hawk found dinner.

A little while ago I noticed some crows were spooked, then I saw this bald eagle circling above. I couldn't get the camera on it until it landed in a distant tree. So thrilled...this is the first one I've ever seen here. Like the beautiful ones Babs posted recently, it didn't hang around long.

Susan

Susan! Good for you - wonderful thrill and shots.

Wow, Susan - those are great shots! I can understand the crows being spooked - apparently crows really hate eagles and will attack them, particularly if their babies are threatened.

Crow Tries to Fight Eagle, Gets Free Ride Instead

Claire - imagining riding on an eagle....

Thank you, Claire. The crows around here regularly chase and even dive-bomb hawks and turkey vultures, but they just took off when the eagle showed up! That's amazing that one would hitch a ride.

Those are wonderful photographs, Susan. Maybe that one will return to your area?

Claire, the series of photos of Crow-on-Eagle were hilarious. I know that crows are feisty and will challenge some of the larger birds here along the river, but I never imagined they would consider an eagle as a "landing spot."

I saw a couple of crows harassing a raven. The raven seemed to sense when the dive bombing crow was getting close and the raven turned over so that it was flying on its back for a short distance and the crow backed off.

Eastern Bluebirds - 3 pair showed up this afternoon. It's all about suet.

I let him try it first.

Is it the kind I like?

Oh, thank goodness - she cleaned the bathtub.

I recently hung a suet cage on an obelisk with rainbow honeysuckle planted inside and I was somewhat surprised to the red buds in our warmer winter. Sorry to see them, actually.

Some birds' expressions really capture my attention. The female bluebird is high on the list.

Mrs. Cardinal

Jane I enjoy the humor in your commentary almost as much as I enjoy the quality of your photos.

Too excited - can't wait to process the other 93 pictures. It's all in the timing. Boy, they were here for a few minutes only. But, the chokeberry isn't cleaned, so they'll be back.

Terrific picture, Jane! Only 94 pictures total? What's the matter, you don't like cedar waxwings? (just kidding) Such a gorgeous bird with such dramatic markings.

And it looks like it's snowing....

Claire

Wow, Jane. Stunning photo! Love it and look forward to more.

Susan

I love all of your great photos and stories. That female bluebird looks like she's asking, "What do you mean, you finished all the mealy worms?"

I am very partial to CWs. Great photo. We've got the usual winter gang here, except I haven't seen any red-breasted nuthatches, nor brown creeper. Lately a couple of red-bellied woodpeckers. The turkeys come daily, but are less tame than they were in the fall.

This is a good time of year to get up at 2 AM, dress warmly, take your iPhone with a few owl call bookmarks, and go owning. Screech owls will fly right across your path to a recording of their kin. Some birding groups have late winter outings and occasionally there are members who aren't afraid of looking unskilled and imitate owl calls. I've had various birds ome to recordings. Be patient. Take hot cocoa ;)

Happy turkeys you have there, Petalique. 2 AM owl calling?...maybe in the summer.

Well, I narrowed it down to 18 pictures, but you know, it's the same species in the same chokeberry bush, so they kinda like alike. Gee...how odd. :)

Cedar Waxwings outside my window

Jane

Jane, love those CWW photos; especially those showing the berries in the WW mouths. Is a choke berry the same as a choke cherry? We had an 8 ft. Chokecherry tree close to the roadside, but DH didn't know I wanted it and it was in his way (for some reason).

Last June I shooed away what is mistook for 5 blue jays at my blueberry bushes (I don't wear glasses when gardening). Doh. As they were flying off, I saw that they were CWWs. I've tried to plant (over the years) for fruit-eating birds, blooms and fragrance. I am just crazy for waxwings and love how they suddenly and randomly arrive.

Yes, summer owling would be more comfortable, but then the foliage would be in the way and it wouldn't be their matting season. It helps to go with a small group of people and when there's no wind. Brrrr.

This thread is getting long so I'll set up a new one soon. As usual, feel free to continue the discussion here, but any new topics should be posted on the new thread, Birds and other mobile features in the garden 2017 #1.

Claire