Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Bird Buffet


I confess I get nearly as much enjoyment from the Kitty TV as does Kitty. These pert diners were gorging themselves well before I hit my desk at 8 this morning. There seems to be a regular rotation of chickadees, pine siskins, house finches, goldfinches, nuthatches and house sparrows through the day. This feeder I fill with select seed - thistle, and a finch mixture. The intention is to lure the birds to this more exposed location, where they might otherwise not go. Another reason why we mounted this feeder on the window was to discourage window strikes. It upsets us to see little feather rosettes pasted to the glass with the force of the impact. It is possible that the small birds are chased into the glass by small hawks. Since the feeder went up, there haven't been any strikes.

Down at the feeder in the yard, as I hoist the tube on the rope after filing it, I get chickadees on the feeder that will ride it up. Nuthatches and goldfinches come next. Crows come later to pick corn from the pile I left out two days ago, after seeing deer probing there beneath the feeder. A flock of house sparrows will come this afternoon and drain much of the seed. Throughout the day juncos will pick around the corn pile for fallen seed, and for the seed I intentionally spill for them.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Joy = thinking about chickadees going for a ride on your feeder!

RuthieJ said...

Hi Kathy,
I'm glad that feeder's also helping to keep the birds from hitting your window (besides providing food for them and entertainment for you and Kitty!)