Archive - Summer 2009
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August 24, 2009 -
During this past summer we saw very little of
the towhee compared to the frequent sightings of
last year's summer months. Foraging among the
vegetation probably was done under the tree
lined edges of our backyard. This year we had
night visitors of skunks and opossums cleaning
up the excess seed from the feeders. |
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| August 21, 2009 -
Today we saw a new bird, who stayed and posed
for several pictures. We were struck by his
coloring, yellow on top with an underside of
grayish white. After looking at quite a few
pictures of small birds, we determined and
rechecked in all the bird books that showed
variations that we were visited by a juvenile
chestnut-sided warbler. |
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...more info and photos |
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| July 31 and August 10, 2009 -
New pictures and research tells us we have a Carolina
Wren in our backyard. |
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...more info and photos
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| May to June, 2009 -
The male house wren appeared to be much bolder
this year. He started nests (sometimes with
enormous sticks) in almost every bird house we
had. He managed to oust the other potential
house hunters (the tree swallows, chickadees,
and bluebirds). But he did frequently sing his
little heart out near the picture-taking window.
(Click on "more..." for wren activities and baby
pix!) |
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...more info and photos |
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| July 2009 Summary: Lots of great stuff going on in our
backyard, neighborhood fireworks, visit from an arborist
to feed and save our favorite trees, new plantings and
more pocket gardens and we can hardly count the new
babies (birds and critters).
First, a little note on the cute but
not necessarily welcome recent and persistent visitors.
Some have come for the birdseed, some for the vegetation
(flowers, shrubs, trees, and vegetables) and some for
all those things. Some visitors are seeking
shelter. Still others come for the sport of hunting. |
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Nocturnal Visitors
(Active at Night):
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Skunks- Between 9
and 10 PM a pair of skunks make their nightly
appearance and try to clean the sunflower seeds
that have fallen on the ground under the
feeders. We try not to make any startling
moves or noises in the house since the doors and
windows are usually open. |
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...more info and photos |
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Opossums- Often we
would see an opossum eating fallen sunflower
seeds near a skunk (they appear to be ignoring
each other). Last night we saw a baby opossum.
He was not as comfortable being close to the
skunks and ran away as soon as he noticed them
on the other side of the yard. |
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....more info and photos |
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Raccoons - The
first time we saw this creature, there were
actually two identical raccoons. They'd go from
feeder to feeder eating as many sunflower seeds
as possible. They are very clever and "handy"
when approaching even the best squirrel-proof
feeder. The one last night would look at us when
we talked and tried to shoo him away. I believe
he was simply amused at our antics, while he
continued to reach in fool-proof feeder
openings. After successfully leaving the
feeders out one evening, we pushed our luck the
second night--back to the grind of storing them
away when the last bird has eaten (well into the
evening) and hanging them back up at the crack
of dawn. |
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Diurnal Guests
(Active during the Day):
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Neighborhood Cats-
We keep our own cats indoors and wish other
people would too. Having so many bird feeders
concentrated in our yard, makes our birds easy
targets. We have taken precautions by
having birdbaths in the open and offering
perches and shelter with trees and bushes in
other areas. Waving our arms and yelling helps
too. |
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Garter Snake- Much
to my surprise, I found a small garter snake
curled up and sleeping right inside my storm
door when the side door was open. They are most
often found amid moist vegetation where they
search for frogs, toads and earthworms. Right
off the edge of the small slate porch outside
the door is an overgrown and very damp garden of
iris, daylilies and mint. The outside water
faucet for the southern side of the house also
often drips here. The toads and frogs we
sometimes see near there had better keep
hopping. |
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Wasps- We noticed
a rapidly developing nest under the eaves of one
of Food Guy's wood shops. These creatures feed
on insects and caterpillars, flies, crickets and
later in the summer seem to enjoy sweets from
human food sources. While we have a perfect
yard for eating out, neither one of us likes to
cook on a grill, entertain (will play host only
to birds and critters and grandkids) or wish to
drag meals, glasses and cutlery outside. We seem
to have enough annoying insects in our yard and
hope the wasps will leave the humans alone.
Where are all the bug eating birds (we may have
given you too much bird seed), frogs (we gave
you a pond) and bats (we gave you a place to
hang out), when we need them? |
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Deer- We planted
twenty small trees (really sticks with roots).
It didn't take us long to realize we would never
live long enough to benefit from any shade they
would cast. Anyway, the deer must have thought
we planted candy sticks with a few tender, juicy
leaves throughout the yard. It wasn't long
before they were gone. Bigger trees are more
expensive, but stand a better chance surviving . |
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...more info and photos |
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Rabbits- Cute as
these guys are, there's a good reason Mr. Mc
Gregorchased Peter Rabbit out of his garden.
New to vegetable gardening Food Guy decided to
build a raised vegetable patch in the manner of
square foot gardening ( more on that later). The
first seedlings were destroyed by a May frost
(no critter was at fault). The second planting
was gone after reaching a 2 inch height (some
critter had a great buffet). Here is a rabbit
waiting for Farmer Food Guy to do a third
planting.. |
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...more...more info and photos |
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Woodchucks- Food Guy tried vegetable gardening
again. For planting number three, he surrounded the
raised garden with plastic netting on all four sides.
This time he believed the woodchucks climbed the netting
and ate most of the new growth. His next strategy was to
cover the top with even more netting. Those little
round guys are much smarter than that. Those impressive
front teeth simply chewed a hole in the side of the
netting and finished off the new vegetables, even the
onion tops- they did leave the straggly tomato plants
(maybe out of pity, but I don't think so). Realizing
Food Guy gave up until next year, the woodchucks, mom
and four of the cutest babies ever, took to camping on
and at the safflower ground feeder. Unfortunately, they
are big-time flower eaters too (goodbye, last year's
coneflowers and joe pyeweed- personal favorites of
birds.weed- personal favorites of
birds. |
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...more info and photos
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| June 13, 2009 - Even
though the American Redstart is considered the
most common and widespread breeding warbler in
the state of New York, we were very excited to
have our first one in the backyard. At first
glance we thought we saw a female, but further
study of the bird books and the photos showed
that our bird was a first year juvenile. He
won't get his orange and black Halloween colors
until next year. |
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...more info and photos |
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June 13,2009 - In looking
through my journal and photos, I realize that
May 16th was the last day we saw the white
crowned sparrow in our backyard.
May 16, 2009 - We are very
much surprised almost every day to still see the
white crowned sparrow hopping around with all
the other ground feeders. Food Guy
optimistically hopes he won't move on to
Northern Canada. |
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...more info and photos |
