What's at your birdfeeder?

“Then they'd look over at you and give you the finger.”

“Did ya hear that, treebait? HPM says he wants you to make him Tofu Surprise for dinner!
:-D”

“SUPRISE!”

“hey real cool, My brother lives in North Jersey and said the snow was coming down but was gonna fill the feeders”

“On Sunday I noticed that the goldfinches at my niger feeder have started making the change in color to their bright yellow summer selves. It seemed like the day before they were muddy yellow, and then boom...with the change in DST they turned int Tweety yellow.”

“No goldfinches here, but the g-----n blue heron I've been chasong off for weeks got a small koi the night before last. Not out of the main pond, but the 45 gal. pond bin on my back porch. THe even littler koi left in there (Frye) won't come out from under the biofilter now.”

“The birdfeeders have been put away until next December. Don’t want them to become bear feeders.”

“Treebait.......get a cat!!!!!!!”

“Divinity...I have seven!”

“very very cool
we have blue jays :) they sound so cool kinda like baby trumpets”

“I just had something very cool happen. I had to put mesh over the koi pond to keep the heron from eating any more pets. It turns out little songbirds land on the edge of the pond now and walk out on the mesh to where it goes under water. They drink, get a bath, hang out and socialize. Every once in a while a fish bumps up against the mesh to check out the birds. Neat!”

“I'm always happy to find new critters and birds in the yard. Ponds seem to attract quite a few.

I put some fish in our pond yesterday (just feeder goldfish), for the first time in about four years. A great white Egret got my last batch. No great loss investment wise but I was sad to see my pretty fish turned into lunch. The new guys are tiny and the lilly pads pretty much cover the pond once full grown. Hoping that might deter anymore hungry birds.

I have a stick I put into our pond for the birds to be able to get drinks. The birdbathes rarely get filled anymore as I don't like putting little pieces of mosquito dunks in them. One disk in the pond and we're squito free.”

“my sister had a red-tail hawk at her feeder...I watched it swoop down and take a dove... gruesome... but brings a whole new definition to bird feeder”

“I have doves, swallows, carolina chickadees, cardinals, blue jays, tohwees, wrens, finches and grackles - and a family of squirrels (mom & three half-grown babies). Once in a while a hawk comes down, but he hasn't managed to catch any birds that I've seen.

We have a bat house to combat the 'skeeters'. They are interesting to watch and a bat can eat up to 3000 skeeters per day!”

“So far I've hit the raccoon that visits my birdfeeders every night with a flashlight and alst night I blasted him with a foghorn...soon, it's the bear spray! But first, I'm gonna have to fix my live tra[ and try and trap it...that usually works....”

“"a whole new definition to bird feeder"
--that is awesome!



bat can eat up to 3000 skeeters per day!”
--which is great, the only problem is they poop on your house about twice that much. Yuk, not to mention unsanitary”

“Hey, bat guano is great for the flowers.”

“ya but it's hell on your lungs/health”

“DNB does this species prefer sunflower seeds, or millet?
Oh, I know, just a suit block right?”

“No. Carrion.”

“Why so gruesome lately nigal?

My dad has had a bat house up for ten years now and has yet to attract any bats. I guess because of that I haven't even tried.
The skeeters don't get bad unless I forget to put a mosquito dunk in our pond. If left alone it makes a mighty nice nursery. The fishies will help with that too now.”

“looks like a cat to me”

“I just scared a teal out of the koi pond. It was a really cute little thing.

All the fish are accounted for.”

“dead sparrows, and .22 cassings LOL!!!”

“this morning I had a rose-breasted grosbeak and and indigo bunting”

“I'm totally geeked right now!

I was sitting by the koi pond looking at the waterfall to see if I could make it splash some more (aeration) and a hawk (the kind that eats birds and squirrels from treetops; I forgot the name) landed 5 feet in front of me, in the waterfall! It got a drink and a bath, groomed a bit and took off. Sa-Weet!”

“Coolio!

I think that's like a sign or something.”

“A sign like.....



...where are the fish? :-)”

“LOL....”

“All the fish are accounted for! This is a light colored hawk, that plucks blue jays from the branches of live oaks. My bird ID book is already packed away, so I can't positively identify it.”

“We had a hawk visiting our back yard when the puppy was 9-12 weeks old. All the birds left. The hawk must have moved on as the small birds are returning to the feeders.






Oh, and the puppy is still here..about twice the size at 5 months. :-)”

“I like the smaller birds. Oh, we have plenty of hawks and a few blad eagles but the trees & mountain laurel give them cover.

My favorite are the chickadee's. Bundles of energy in cold weather. Followed by finches. In warmer weather, we have a bunch of humming birds.

I'll hang the feeders on my field stone shed. Don't like the mess they make against the house or on the patio.

Almost finished a free standing patio pavillion with a 17'x17' roof. This will expand my 14'x24' concrete patio a bit.”

“My cousin, a railroad engineer, told me of hitting a blue heron with his train. The bird merely bounced off, hit the ground and flew away. Go figure.”

“Blue herons are tough birds. They're also enemy #1 to koi owners. The females feed during the day, and the males feed at night. I used a combination of netting (over the pond,) spray from a garden hose, and borrowing a neighbor's dog to dissuade the bird(s) from returning.”

“I guess a train wouldn't have worked then...”

“teebeast666, the bird may have been a sharpshinned hawk. They are bird hunters, watching em fly through a thick woods as they hunt is amazing. I watched one while bear hunting years back.

BTW the pond sounds wonderful, I have enjoyed reading about it.”

“There's a link to the photos of the pond over at the gardening thread, Birch.”

“Tree that is awesome!

We came home one day and a hawk was sitting on the roof. He never moved...until we frightened his pending dinner and it hopped away!”

“There was big hawk that spent about 2 weeks hanging around my mom's back yard. It was huge, and it eliminated the snake and rat population. I thought it was a juvie eagle at first. That thing dwarfed the fence post it was on.”

“Not quite at a birdfeeder, but I just watched a redtail hawk soar by my office window.”

“Cool Beans lum!

Hey..I have a question. Would a hawk nab a song bird at the feeder? I came home to a pile of feathers not long ago..no remains at all just feathers..so I thought it might be a hawk, not a cat.”

“at our birdfeeder. . .
the usual: house finches, whitecrowned sparrows, house sparrows, mourning doves, sometimes song sparrows.

occasionally: western blue birds, scrub jays.

in the area but not at the feeder: black phoebes, rufus sided towhees, lesser gold finch, buicks wrens, bushtits, turkey vultures, red tailed hawks, red shouldered hawks, sharpshinned hawks, falcons, crows & ravens.

not seen in a while: western king birds, tri-colored black birds, brewers blackbirds, kestrals.

we are on a migratory path so we have seen unusual birds cross our path, stay a week or so and leave. we had two this summer, but i can't for the life of me remember what they were now. major brain fart going on here.

yes, we have birds of prey grab birds at the feeder all the time, usually the mourning doves because they are the slowest. but that's ok- hey they gotta eat too ya know! i really think it's cool when the hawks swoop down and grab the rabbits right in front of you; what awesome grace and power!”

“I forgot some

everyday: four Anna's Hummingbirds who fight over our hummingbird feeder. we call the one who dominates squeaker.

occasionally: robins

in the top of our tree: woodpeckers, I forget which one.”

“We have a hawk with a preference for bluejays. I don't see the actaul nabbing often; I usually find out because there's 20 something bluejays around here screaming their heads off afterwards.”

“We regularly get Chikadees, Nuthatches and Downy Woodpeckers at our feeders. The last few days they've been so much more active.

A few days ago, we had a pair of Pileated Woodpeckers hanging out at the suet and the trees.”

“I have a nazi ninja squirrel that I am at war with”

“I got a redheaded woodpecker workin the shutters up and down pickin bugs out....i guess............”

“I brought a squirrel proof feeder from downstate that has worked flawlessly for a few years. And, we just bought a new (and different) one from Menards this fall. Both rock!

I also love the suction cup ones for the windows. We hang the suet cage on that one.

We have a red squirrel who has taken up residence in the attic, we believe. He hangs out on the deck attempting to get the feeders. That lil f'er is too fast to shoot.”