Pheasant 2

This is about as good as the camera and the photographer gets for an impromptu pic.

The pheasants were very active on this day.

Eastern Phoebe – 2

Help me identify this bird. I believe it’s an Eastern Phoebe, right? I know, the pictures suck. They were taken through a window but still that’s no excuse.

Mourning Doves

These are common visitors to our backyard, seen year round and seemingly tolerant of people.

Lousy cell phone photo at 5X.

American Goldfinch or Warbler?

What is this? My first inclination based upon length and slimness was a warbler but it really doesn’t match anything in my bird book.  When I looked at it some more, it seemed to be closest to a female goldfinch but it isn’t autumn yet.  And it does appear too large to be a finch. Can someone positively identify it?

I saw 4 of these and they seemed to coexist yet later one was aggressive toward another and chased it off.

Blue Jay

As a birder I should like all birds but if I’m being candid, I don’t. For most likely because of its irritating maddening squawking and squealing and it’s king of the hill demeanor, the blue jay falls into the category of birds to hate. The wife thinks the jay is pretty. I can’t deny it has a nice blue color but that doesn’t overcome it’s irritating nature.

Yesterday as I was driving to work just before light broke, a bird flew across the windshield and met its end. That ’s the first time a bird’s ever collided with a car I drove. I couldn’t tell what it was but my guess was that it was a swallow.

Downy Woodpecker 2

This is one of those rare moments where I can take a picture with decent resolution of a bird in the backyard. This photo was taken at about 3 ft. away through the kitchen window.

The picture doesn’t do this cutie justice. I love watching this bird flitting around the railing and balusters pecking away to find food. I missed an opportunity to take a photo with its mate.

Pheasant Kaboom

I saw a male pheasant about 80 yards ahead running across the highway just like the Roadrunner out of an old Roadrunner cartoon.  Also about 80 yards ahead was a Mitsubishi Eclipse. As this scene quickly unfolded, my first thought was look at the “chicken” playing chicken to get to the other side of the road. Then just like that the pheasant disappeared from view for a millisecond.  The pheasant lost the race across the highway and exploded in a large plume of feathers extending 15 ft into the air and its lifeless body was tossed onto the other side of the road.

This was the first time I was eyewitness to such an unexpected, sad, yet unbelievable sight.

Turkey Vulture & Bald Eagle – Scavengers

I often see turkey vulture soaring in the air but never saw first hand one that was on the ground pecking away at carrion…that is until yesterday. It was just a neat sight seeing this huge bird pecking at the remains of road kill rabbit.

Early in the year I saw a bald eagle perched on top of road kill deer. I didn’t know they were scavengers unitl I saw that. It was a total surprise.

Baltimore Oriole 2

For the second time in my life, I’ve seen a Baltimore Oriole out in the real world. I was walking along and saw this brilliant flash of orange and coal black. It was fairly tolerant of me. I probably got within about 15 ft of it.

I’m pretty sure it was a Baltimore Oriole but these new damn Transition lenses just don’t cut it for a bird watcher.

A few days earlier I believe I saw a warbler and also about 20 nuthatches or something similar pecking on the ground. Again the damn Transistions just mute the color and make positive ID for this beginning birder difficult.

Turkey Vulture

At least weekly I get to see these almost regal soaring birds circling on thermals. Their ugliness is almost beautiful.