Kerfuffle in Bird World

Yowza! It's mating/nesting season in bird world. What a noisy lot of activity in the backyard on this seventy-five degree February day in Georgia.  Chase games, male bravado, territory claims, and mating connections. One could almost spin around blindfolded and point, to choose what to write about.

Today I choose a sudden loud persistent eruption coming from a big sloppy nest in the high crook of a tree branch in the way-back part of the yard. From a distance, I could see and hear many small birds flying around the nest in a fury of righteous indignation and effusive scolding.  I approached slowly to see what I could see. There were at least a dozen birds and three species circling the nest and flitting in and out of the surrounding bare branches (still too early for leaves). Tufted titmice, white-breasted nuthatches, and chickadees, the highest percentage of these being titmice. Eventually, they quieted and flew away, leaving me wondering what happened. I went back later with a camera for a shot of the nest.

Not sure, but looks like a squirrel's nest to me. Why the attention from so many small birds?

I will never know the reason for the kerfuffle in a nest way too big for any of those tiny species, but one thing I have learned from previous observations. Whenever such outrageous scolding erupts in bird world, it is not without cause. Somebody had invaded somebody else's rights, and the victim had called for help. In the society of the backyard, it appeared to be the equivalent of a military response to a great social injustice, minus a newspaper account to inform us of the details. In the silent and mysterious aftermath I can only hope the little guys won. dkm

Birdly Bird

Big excitement in the limited birding world of this backyard spectator. A single wood thrush. First sighting ever. December 9, 2010, 8:30am. Temperature below freezing, in the 20s. Seems late for migrating. Staying here for the winter? Cinnamon brown head, plainer brown back, distinctively spotted breast, round fat body, long straight beak, pretty pink feet. Foraging for sunflower seeds on the deck floor beneath the feeder. Stayed a long time, hopping around, showing herself at all angles, flipping oak leaves around, unaware of my presence, just four feet away on the other side of the glass. She held me captive for the duration of her visit. An excellent and birdly bird.

8:30-9:00 seems to be the current peak time for coming to the feeder. Other birds at feeder this morning between 8:30 & 9:00: male and female cardinals, house finches, carolina chickadees, tufted titmice, brown-headed nuthatches, whitebreasted nuthatches, my bluebirds (calloo callay), downy woodpeckers, a single female towhee. dkm

What the Titmice Taught Me

Watching this family of fledgling titmice at close range over my week of breakfasts on the front porch swing at the fish camp/bayhouse has been enlightening and confounding.

Enlightening in that titmice have a much wider variety of songs than the simple Peter-Peter-Peter that Roger Tory Peterson describes. They also have a chirring sound, a chip chip, and a meowing-like tune. And sometimes a cheer cheer similar to a cardinal, all directly observed. Not as loud as a cardinal.

Confounding in that the more I learn, the more I realize I don't know. They sometimes sound so much like a cardinal I would have thought I was mistken, if I hadn't been watching them produce the sounds. I may never again be able to distinguish between the two without an actual sighting.

And to complicate the conundrum, I did spy a cardinal in the driveway later, when called to the porch by what I thought was the song of titmouse, only to discover a mockingbird singing his heart out on the porch rail, making a mockery of the whole question. dkm