Here’s the cardinal pair visiting my fall feeding setup.
Mr. and Mrs. Cardinal in the fall
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New England birds in fall video
As promised, here’s a video of the New England fall feeder birds — it will be the most relaxing 23 minutes of your day.
Fiesty nuthatch with fiery background
Here’s a scary, fall-themed bird photo to kick off your Halloween.
This white-breasted nuthatch was not in a sharing mood with the surrounding tufted titmice. Click here for a recent For the Birds column regarding white-breasted nuthatches and migration.
A few different birds showed up
Yesterday’s rain did not deter the birds from coming to my homemade feeder, which I worked so hard on. Actually, I found a log in the backyard and placed it on my deck railing. Anyway Continue reading
Feeder birds with New England fall backdrop II
Here’s part II of my fall feeder birds of New England post. Click here for the original post.
Feeder birds with New England fall backdrop
There’s nothing like a New England fall, especially when it provides a colorful backdrop for bird photos. I found a rotted log in my backyard, positioned it on my deck railing in front of a small sassafras tree, sprinkled some sunflower seeds and peanuts on the log and enjoyed the show. It was nonstop action for hours. I hope to make a video soon as well.
For the Birds: Busy, busy feeders
Activity at the birdfeeders has been nonstop. I have not seen any of the winter finches or really anything out of the ordinary, but the regulars are showing up in droves. I did see a palm warbler in the birdbath and a few yellow-rumped warblers in the trees.
I’m not alone in being invaded by feeder birds. Bill from Keene wrote recently and made an interesting analogy regarding the many birds at his feeders when he likened the action to an airport terminal. His visitors have included tons of juncos, jays, robins and many more. “Almost clouds, all flying madly, like insects,” Bill wrote. “Looks like an airline terminal.”
I really do like the airport analogy and thought of it the next time I watched my feeders. My frequent fliers are titmice, chickadees, white-breasted nuthatches and downy Continue reading
Caption this photo as nuthatch feeds from its own cup
Guess who was messing around with birdfeeder photo props again? I’m being overrun by white-breasted nuthatches this fall, so I figured: Why not?
Can you come up with a clever caption?
Splendidly iridescent grackle
A common grackle visits a feeder in New England, October 2020.
I know some people get overrun by grackles, but I hardly ever see them at my feeders. When two showed up on a recent sunny day, I was able to capture the brilliant colors of their iridescent plumage. Grackles are blackbirds, but when the sun hits them just right, they are also green, blue and purple.
For the Birds: Good news from the Winter Finch Forecast
The 2020-21 Winter Finch Forecast is out and it looks like it could be an exciting next several months in New England.
This is the first forecast by Tyler Hoar. Ron Pittaway did the forecast for several decades before passing the torch to Hoar this year. The Winter Finch Forecast is a prediction of what finch (and other) species may irrupt into New England and parts south and west. An irruption is when northern birds move to or through an area in abnormally high numbers. For example, many years we get very few or even no pine siskins. Other years we get so many we can’t fill the feeders fast enough. Irruptions occur mainly due to food availability, or lack thereof. If it is a bad crop year up north for a certain type of food, such as pine cone seeds, irruptions may occur as birds move in search of food sources.
According to Hoar, this is shaping up to be a good year for purple finches and evening grosbeaks. It is also a year when red-breasted nuthatches are moving south in high numbers. Perhaps you’ve seen more of these small, charismatic birds than usual in your yard this fall already. I hadn’t seen or heard a red-breasted nuthatch in my yard for about four years. This fall, I’ve had three already. I’ve seen only one, and heard the other two. Red-breasted nuthatches have higher-pitched songs and calls than their cousins, the white-breasted nuthatch. It’s an unmistakable difference once you learn it. Red-breasted nuthatches are the more common nuthatch throughout much of New England, particularly up north. In southern New England, irruption years of red-breasted nuthatches are a special treat as they are not resident birds.
The Winter Finch Forecast covers finches such as redpolls, crossbills and siskins, as well as a few small birds that aren’t finches. Irruptions are not limited to these small birds, of course. Who can forget the winter of 2013-14 when snowy owls were all the rage and showed up in places they’d never been seen before?
To see the full forecast, enter “2020-21 Winter Finch Forecast” into a web search and have at it. Are we likely to see common redpolls this winter? I’ll leave that research up to you. I’m always looking forward with excitement regardless of the season, but the Winter Finch Forecast offers that much more incentive to cheer on winter and the colder months. Winter is not so bad after all.
Birds of New England.com 