So What's in My Yard?

Considering I've been feeding consistently since late summer, there hasn't been a lot of variety.   I'm sure some species that came around I just haven't seen, and there have been glimpses of species I just haven't been able to identify.    I'll dedicate a post to the unidentified ones later.

House sparrows.   30-40 show up, recently enough to look like a feathered boil around the feeders.

Eurasian collared doves.   In early fall I was getting close to 30 of these.  With winter it's been more like 10-20.

White winged doves.    Very pretty birds, with blue around the eye, often bluish bill, an irridescence on top of the head and back, and some variety in shade, with the smaller ones dark gray.    Back in the summer I considered these rare, and once saw four close together.   As fall wore on into winter, there was one that showed up regulrly.   In late December there have been more including several smaller darker ones.   I'd guess at least four show up some time every day.

House finches.   Probably a dozen,counting both male and female.   I'm not sharp on separating house finches from purple finches.   I think some were purple finches but no positive ID.  And the male house finches vary in the amount of red they show;  some are red only on head and throat, and in some the red color goes down the belly.   I've seen raspberry shades;  those may have been purple finches, can't say.

Curve-billed thrashers.   A pair has been resident here since at least 2013.   Raised at least one brood last year.   Accustomed to my presence and come to within four feet when hungry.    When hungry, one of them has conditioned me into bringing out food when it perches on a branch in front of the kitchen door.    All the cholla and prickly pear cactus is a likely reason why they hang around;  their nest(s) are in cholla cactus.

Last October I identified my first pyrrhuloxia, a male.   Then in December a female showed up.   In late December-early January another female came by.  I have seen three pyrrhuloxia at one time, and perhaps another skinnier male too, but usually it's just the fat female (fat from having easy pickin's here for a couple of months) and one male.   I've read that pyrrhuloxias flock together, but from what I've seen they don't like each other.    Some chasing observed.



In the heavy snow of December 30, 2015 (heck, it was something like 8" here, hardly significant in half the USA), a single male cardinal showed up.     He was a consistent visitor while the snow was on the ground, and occasionally afterward.   Haven't seen him for a few days.   Possible the swarm of house sparrows has driven him away.    I have never seen and identified a female cardinal.

A dark-eyed junco, slate gray variety was seen, November 19 and again during the December 30 snow and after.  Feeding on the ground, never on or in a feeder, though it did pick up spilled seeds below a feeder.

The above are the most regular visitors.   Some birds in the hood do not come by the feeders, such as starlings (3-4 hang out next door) and great-tailed grackles.   When I threw out part of a pizzaa, that brought a couple of grackles.    The resident mockingbird doesn't come to the feeders.

Birds more rare are:

Ladder-back woodpecker observed spiraling around a dead tree October 11, 2015.

I plan to leave most dead trees up, just to appeal to woodpeckers!  

Rufous-sided towhee (spotted towhee) seen a couple of days beginning October 13 foraging in the short grass.

Common nighthawks flying overhead, plentiful through September, then disappearing in October.

Vesper sparrow seen October 16 in grass and perched on limb.

White-throated sparrow feeding on seeds on the ground October 17.

January 3 in the snow, American goldfinches and also 1-2 yellow-rumped warblers were seen at the low platform feeder.

In January, several visits by 1-3 sparrows that are, after 3 weeks, still unidentified.

The most spectacular visitor was this one --

Cooper's Hawk (or possible sharp-shinned/Cooper's hybrid, since imo the head coloration is more like a sharp-shinned, while the tail feathers indicate a Cooper's/   Both are known to be drawn to feeders in search of prey.   On Jan. 6, at about 11 a.m. I looked out the back door and saw this fellow perched between a swinging feeder (that pail in the pic) and a low platform feeder.  Took the pics through the door window plexiglass and the storm door glass, both dirty.

Back in December I noticed a hawk flying high overhead, harassed by 3-4 smaller birds.   Think it was a buteo.

And of course there are the Canada geese flying overhead.   Saw seven flying low this day.   Haven't identified any snow geese or brants overhead.

Today, Feb. 2, I saw a ruby-crowned kinglet around the arborvitae evergreen trees in front, sometimes hovering like a hummingbird to peck at something in the evergreen leaves.   Since the kinglet is an insect eater, it must have been insects, but in the winter?    I had seen the kinglet a couple of months before.    Today I was leaning against a porch post, and the little bird came to within 4 feet.   Saw the hovering behavior twice.