Category: Birds

Posted on in Chickens, Gardening, Veggies

The Garden and the Fire

Photo by by sierachris
Photo by by sierachris

I had planned to write an interesting and informative post about woodpeckers for today, but life was interrupted this past week. I’m sure you’ve heard about the massive fire in Black Forest, Colorado. Well, guess where we live… yup, Black Forest, Colorado. We were evacuated within hours of the fire’s start, and have been unable to get back into our house until now. We are grateful that we still have a house to get back into!

You can read more about our personal experience on my other blog, www.compost-blog.com. Today I’d like to share about what I am calling the miracle garden.

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Posted on in Birding Tips, Birds

The Early Birder…

American Avocet_AlamosaNWR-CO_LAH_2180… catches the bird. While it’s not wise to be an early worm, being an early birder pays off. You’ll see more birds than those who sleep in and, if you’re a bird photographer, you’ll have better light to capture them by.

I was once again reminded of this during a couple of back-to-back visits to the Alamosa National Wildlife Refuge, in south-central Colorado.

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Posted on in Birding Trips, Birds

Bird Nerd Heaven

CFO GroupBirding and Nature Festivals are springing up all over the country. Start in January at the Wings Over Willcox Birding & Nature Festival in Arizona, or the Morro Bay Bird Festival in California, and continue to the Rio Grande Valley Birding Festival and New Mexico’s Festival of the Cranes in November—if you have the airfare and the time, you can spend an entire year flitting from festival to festival, returning home just in time for the Christmas Bird Count.

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Posted on in Birds

Birds Have Rights

Great Horned Owl nestling @Peyton 17may2008 LAH 008rA pair of Great Horned Owls recently decided to nest in a tree at a major intersection here in town. Not smart. Still, their choice of nest spots provided their growing family with an ever increasing number of fans… and tons of harassment. It’s unbelievable what some people will do. You can read the whole horrendous story* in our local paper. It makes one wonder about the intelligence level of our population.

The caution sign was largely ignored—people were much too close. Some idiots were poking the twiggy structure with sticks, trying to make the parents fly. Others were climbing the tree. In fact, families sent their small children up the tree for a peek into the nest! Don’t they know that the owls are dangerous?

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Posted on in Birding Tips, Birds

How to Name a Bird, Part 2

If you missed last Monday’s Part 1, be sure to read that post first. Now I’ll continue with my identification checklist.

What does it look like?
Golden-crowned Sparrow_CosumnesRiverPreserve-CA_LAH_0312This is the obvious one, but even here there are often too many details to take them all in at once. I usually start with color, and “general impression of size and shape” (GISS). Are there any obvious marks that might narrow things down?

If the bird is still posing for me, I move to the details. What color is the eye, and is there an eye-ring? What about the beak? Long or short, pointed (for bug-catching) or wedge-shaped (for seed-cracking), curving or straight? On a sitting bird, do the wings protrude past the tail? What color are the legs and feet? Is there anything else that stands out?

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Posted on in Birding Tips, Birds

How to Name a Bird, Part 1

Golden-crowned Sparrow_CosumnesRiverPreserve-CA_LAH_0338What in the world is that bird? Birding someplace new is fun and exciting, but it’s also a challenge. How do you make a trip list if you can’t identify the birds you are seeing?

I normally post a bird ID quiz on the first Monday of the month. Today and next week, I thought I’d share about the mental checklist I go through when I’m trying to ID a bird I don’t immediately recognize.

I get to travel a bit. In addition to field trips here in Colorado, I’ve been birding in southern Texas, Arizona, Florida, Indiana, and the west coast. I was really excited when we went to Puerto Rico several years ago. We stayed at a friend’s time share ideally situated between a wildlife refuge and a bird sanctuary. I was having so much fun, I almost didn’t notice the 99° temperatures or the 99% humidity. Almost.

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Posted on in Birds

What Time Should I Expect You?

Mourning Dove_FCNC-CO_LAH_0385.nefWhen does migration bring new birds to Colorado? I’ve been pondering that question ever since I started birding. As a gardener with years of experience, I know when to plant each crop or flower. I know that 70° afternoons can be followed by 3° nights. Yes, April is like that—don’t be fooled.

But migration varies from species to species, and even sometimes from year to year. Instead of learning when to set out a dozen veggie varieties, I have to become familiar with the timing of hundreds of birds. For the most part, that’s still a huge mystery to me.

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Posted on in Birds, Books

The Bluebird Effect—Not Just Another Nature Book

The Bluebird Effect, by Julie Zickefoose

Maybe birding results from having a “collection gene.” (At least a bird collection—aka a “life list”—doesn’t take up any space on a shelf, and as a bonus, it never needs dusting.) I don’t just collect birds, I seem to also accumulate books. Like many birders I have a shelf full of delightful books, each chronicling the nature experiences of an author. From a Victorian lady’s garden journal to the a thin volume exploring the seasons of the north woods, I can immerse myself in the great outdoors from the comfort of my favorite chair.

I have to admit, however, that many of these books work equally well as sleeping pills. Reading detailed descriptions of the weeds on someone’s farm just doesn’t generate the page-turning anticipation of a good adventure story.

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