Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Birding

The European Starling
I saw a bird using the bird house that my son Nicolas built. I set my camera up and waited for the bird to come back... waited some more... and then had to go to work. But while waiting this bird flew down, took some straw from the dog house and landed on the wire. So to make the waiting in the cold this morning somewhat worth it, I took a photo of it. But this is not my favorite bird in the back yard by any means. It is rather cool that it is speckled and then in the summer it turns a shiny purple black. That moves it up the favorite list, just a little. So this evening I took my "Birds of New York" book down off the shelf and read up a little on the bird. I found out that it actually sings and can mimic other birds and sounds so that makes me like it just a bit more. Some nice soul from Europe thought that New York City needed this bird. So back in 1890-1891 they introduced it to the area. Must be they liked the bird and couldn't bear to leave it behind.

I have been researching ways to keep it out of my feeder so the birds that I want to see can actually get the seed. Looks like I need to set up bird feeders with the food that they like and in the other feeders, put the foods that they don't. Also need to put those feeders away from the others, preferably on the outside edge of the property. This weekend looks to be a wash as far as the weather is concerned so I won't be doing it then. But the first nice weekend or weekday when I have more than just a few moments, I will be setting it up in hopes that it works.

I hope to get photo's of other birds and record what I have learned about them over the course of the spring, summer and fall. Maybe over the upcoming winter as well.

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