A very Happy New Year to you from all your feathered friends and myself who, like you, have stayed here to endure and, maybe enjoy, some of our winter months. The weather has certainly not helped in making us feel like it will be too jolly, especially with today’s freezing rain! Anyway enough of that and on to what I am supposed to be doing, and that is to talk about the birds, who set a good example to us and “carry on regardless”! Their’s, and the three variety of squirrels’, daily attendance at my feeders are a good indication of that!
The very snowy December days certainly made the feeders more attractive and necessary in the birds’ quest for food of some sort, and they certainly attracted them. Our flock of Rock Pigeons were evident as were the Mourning Doves and Juncos, who, being mainly ground feeders, appreciated the sprinklings of bird seed that I made as I restocked the higher ones. A couple of Mourning Doves came right into the lee of the house by our basement windows and peaked in! What a lovely surprise, and one that enabled me a much closer view than I normally get of them. In the shelter they both “hunkered down”, as they do, for a while and kept themselves warm in their beautifully colored plumage. The pigeons kept their distance and stayed under the garden feeders competing with the Bluejays and squirrels and the occasional Cardinal!
Besides our ground feeders, my suspended feeders got, and still get, continual usage from the Gold Finches, Chickadees, both sorts of Nuthatches, and the occasional House Finches, the male of whom added some red coloring to the scene. Of course the red spot on the heads of the male woodpeckers also did this too, so the lack of really bright colors is not that complete during our long winter, which is something to be grateful for and enjoyed. I hope you get to see some of them too in this new year,— enjoy!
Stay safe and well,
Cheers,
John Baldwin
