January 12, 2010 - The Carolina wren is getting bolder and coming closer into camera range in pursuit of water. Lucky placement of heated birdbath for all of us. He has really developed a taste for solid seed shapes too.

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January 08, 2010 - A Carolina wren stopped by for a quick snack on the dinner bell feeder. It's loaded with three rings of mixed seed stackables (one even has suet).  We got the stackables and taller, similar seed cylinders, plus the great covered feeder at our local Wild Birds Unlimited Shop in Saratoga, New York..

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January 05, 2010 - The Northeast has had its second but biggest snowfall of this winter, leaving about 16 inches of the white stuff in our backyard.  Needless to say the bird activity has greatly increased, the heated birdbaths empty faster and all feeders and shoveled ground areas are in constant need of replenishing.  Into the mix, we have seen the almost dreaded return of some pine siskins. Last winter the usually occasional visitors felt more like an invasion. While we would still like to see a few, our backyard seemed ill-equipped for the onslaught. Even though we have better accommodations this winter, we want first to care for our birds who faithfully call our yard home.

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December 1, 2009 - We had set up outdoor lighting (really Christmas flood lights) giving us a view of most of the feeders in our side yard. After dark we wouldn't see any birds, of course, but could catch the antics of skunks, opossums, raccoons and rabbits. Glancing out the window (not really looking for an early visit from Santa) I saw a peculiar creature clinging to a peanut nugget feeder.

He had a ridge of fur-covered skin connecting his front foot, down his side, to his hind foot. My first thought was that this could be a bat, but the large flat tail suggested otherwise. After snapping several rather blurry pictures, I grabbed my mammal reference books.  I then had to debate whether this was a northern flying squirrel or a southern one (his accent didn't give him away). Both of these squirrels can claim our area of upstate NY home territory.

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November 17, 2009 - Food Guy was able to capture a ton of pictures of a juvenile white-tailed deer. It still had several faint rows of white spots on its back. The fawn didn't seem overly skittish as he tried to get as close as possible. He traveled and grazed alone. While the male fawn is more likely to travel alone, this deer showed no sign of any pedicles (permanent structures between the ears of a buck fawn from which antlers grow).

Our juvenile deer seems to know he is handsome and appears very self-assured. Sure hope he'll visit us in our backyard again.

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November 04, 2009 - This was a surprise picture captured with our first birdcam. After viewing this we began putting out apple slices, pieces of other fruit and carrots on the paver stone table and on the ground around it. It didn't take long for the fruit to freeze completely to the table (Oops!).  Never saw the fawn return for a snack, but we did capture an eastern cottontail out  for an evening snack.

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October 18, 2009 - Yesterday we caught a brief glance of a junco, crunching around in the leaves.  Today we were able to take pictures of one of our favorite cold weather friends.

November and December, 2009 - We seem to have more juncos this year.  They came for the fall and are now really enjoying the winter activities.

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