Tag Archives: birds

The Elusive Pileated

Posted on February 22, 2013 by AnnieRie

Finally!! I got a picture of the pileated woodpecker, at least one of them, that have been living at the edge of our property for the past two years. We hear them all the time. I saw one of them once a year ago. Today they came out and visited the side yard right out our window.

Not the best picture as he wouldn’t keep his head still, but I did get him as he was checking out all our dead trees on the property line. I also managed to catch him as he left. Twice.

A highlight on a dreary rainy day in west county. The varied bird community on the edge of the forest and the fields.

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Unlikely Friendships

Posted on February 19, 2013 by AnnieRie

Animals that don’t normally get along, getting along quite well. Jennifer Holland, author of the NYT bestseller

Unlikely Friendships: 47 Remarkable Stories from the Animal Kingdom

and a contributing writer for National Geographic magazine, is coming to the Howard County Conservancy this Sunday the 24th to give a program for families and those young at heart who love animals.

A cat and a bird. A mare and a fawn. An elephant and a sheep. A snake and a hamster. Pictures and stories, behind the scenes tales of her adventures as well. Here is the link to the flier for the event.

The cost is $10 a family and the admission supports the conservancy’s education programs held all year long. What unlikely friendships do you know? Do you have any pictures? Bring them to add to the fun and the discussion.

Are my blue jay and squirrel unlikely dining companions?

They probably are just tolerating one another.

Besides this event on Sunday, next week the volunteer training begins for us for the spring school programs. If training and hiking begins, can spring be far behind?

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Posted in Birds, Community, Family, Howard County, Nature, Volunteering and tagged birds, community, family, Howard County, howard county conservancy, nature, photography, volunteering. Bookmark the permalink.

Dishes and Laundry

Posted on February 18, 2013 by AnnieRie

Sometimes I think it’s all I ever do. They told us in financial planning courses that we would be spending more time in our cars and more time traveling and eating out after we retired. Funny, that isn’t what we are doing. I swear I spend way more time with the laundry and the dishwasher.

Why? Eating in the house way more than we did when we worked. Cooking from scratch.

All those freezer containers. And, breakfast and lunch all week in the house. We may eat out a few times a week now, but those 10 extra meals, plus all the cooking, means more dishes to wash. I really hadn’t thought of that. Add to that, the laundry. We live in Tee shirts, jeans, shorts and sweaters. No more dry cleaning or taking shirts to the laundry. We are wearing things that we throw in the washer and dryer.

In the summer, those sweaty items after gardening, or yard work. In the fall, after leaf raking. No more fancy work clothes taken to the cleaners to be done. I wonder if we need to have the septic tanks cleaned more often than we used to, now that we are home most days.

Retirement is definitely changing what we do, and when. For example, today I started to run a few errands. Including my emissions test. Until I realized it was a holiday and they weren’t open. So, I bagged the trip to Costco, Trader Joe’s and the emissions station until later this week. When the working people went back to their jobs and left the stores relatively crowd free.

After almost three years, I really feel retired. Doing what we want when we want. Not constrained to the weekends. Besides doing errands, I need to use that last red envelope at Iron Bridge. Maybe lunch sometime this week. Beating those dinner crowds.

Ah, retirement. Loving it. Glad we decided to do it. It’s way more fun counting juncos for the bird count, than commuting in snow or ice.

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Posted in Birds, Retirement, Weather and tagged birds, nature, retirement, weather. Bookmark the permalink.

Six Feeders No Waiting

Posted on February 10, 2013 by AnnieRie

Since today was lovely, I went out and did some feeder maintenance and filled everything before next week’s Great Backyard Bird Count.

If you want to do something fun with your family or friends, try and spend just a little time between the 15th and 18th counting the birds you see in your yard, or in a public area near you. It is simple to do, and you don’t need to be an experienced birder. The count had over 100,000 participants last year. Many from this area. In Maryland alone, there were over 2000 checklists submitted. Quite a few from Howard County. Ellicott City and Columbia led the county in participants with 83 lists from each area.

I watch right out my kitchen window for a few hours on one of the days and put in my totals. Since I have a habitat established with regular visitors, I know I will have certain times of the day with dozens of birds popping in to get food and water.

Today was no exception. I had three downy woodpeckers, all female, out there at the same time.

Don’t know where the males were today, but the females kept coming back. I also put peanuts in the shell out there today to check out the blue jays. I had at least six between those on the ground and in the trees. They are a riot to watch, as they go looking for the biggest and heaviest peanuts. Last year there were fewer blue jays reported. Including by me. This year they are back.

Of course, with peanuts out there, at some point the squirrel showed up and the blue jays had to go into overdrive to get the lion’s share of the peanuts.

Today also brought the return of the female red bellied woodpecker. We haven’t seen her around here much lately. Just the male, but out of nowhere she showed up to grab peanuts herself.

At one point, the nuthatch joined the party. Here a young downy and the nuthatch are enjoying the new food.

And, just to show that sometimes they do tolerate each other, I leave you with a photo worthy of submitting for the Conservancy program on unlikely friendships. Animal photos of unlikely pairings of animals. That event is on the 24th of February. Another family activity coming up in the next few weeks in the area.

Peaceful coexistence. Unusual for them. If you can, make time to count birds next weekend in Howard County. Let’s help Cornell and the Audubon Society keep tabs on where the birds are located by creating our own “census”.

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Posted in Birds, Community, Hobbies, Howard County, Nature and tagged birds, community, hobbies, Howard County, nature, photography. Bookmark the permalink.

Young at Heart

Posted on February 6, 2013 by AnnieRie

At least that’s how I feel these days. Even though at times the body tells me I am doing too much. I was putting items of interest onto my calendar. Volunteer naturalist training. Habitat restoration. Wonder walks. Program committee meetings. All at the Conservancy.

Add to that the bird club events, programs, and the Great Backyard Bird Count coming up the weekend of the 16th-17th of February.

There’s Greenfest, Earth Day and mixed in with all the rest there are cellar dinners, get togethers, luncheons, and family commitments.

I can’t believe a year has passed since I was getting ready for neck surgery. Thankfully, that is behind me and I am filling our social calendar with possibilities of days out and about. It may be the last month of winter, but things are getting busy. This weekend besides the Ray Bosmans event at the Conservancy Saturday, on Sunday there is the first event at the Little French Market in Ellicott City with River House Pizza selling wood fired pizza.

If you think retirement means days passing time sitting at a senior center playing cards and getting your blood pressure checked, think again. There is so much more out there to do in Howard County. Oh, and I almost forgot. We are having a much anticipated bloggers and friends party at Union Jack’s on February 26th. Check out the link and sign up if you want to meet many of the bloggers on my Blogs I Read page, and from hocoblogs. I may be one of our oldest bloggers out there, but still, I insist that retirement is my second childhood and I will definitely be enjoying myself.

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The Competition for Dinner

Posted on January 30, 2013 by AnnieRie

In keeping with the bird theme this week, I am noticing that the backyard predators are becoming patio and deck predators. They must be running out of field mice, voles and other rodents down in the meadow.

Friday the young Cooper’s hawk decided to hang out in the maple tree off our patio and watch the happenings. What is interesting about this predator, the birds don’t seem to care about him. He is looking for bigger prey usually. While he was there the juncos just remained in the burning bush.

Now today, the sharp shinned hawk felt like making the bird bath his perch in case any small birds were inclined to show up. He didn’t even flinch as I took at least a dozen pictures of him through the patio door. He was about 25 feet away from our door.

He causes the most havoc around here. Swoops in low and at high speed and the birds scatter. Occasionally one hits a window in their panic and he gets an easy meal. It is the trade off here. No cover in the winter on the deciduous trees and bushes, so the birds are more vulnerable.

I do know this year the two of them are doing a very good job at keeping mice out of the house. The population must be smaller due to their constant hunting in the garden and the meadow. I have only trapped one this winter. Usually I have at least half a dozen squeezing up through the openings to the crawl space under the washer and dryer. We have to have traps in the laundry room all winter. This year either the warmer weather, or the presence of two predators is keeping them at bay.

It took me a while to get used to them when we moved here. Being up close and personal to acipitors is just part of the whole experience in this rural setting.

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Celebrating the Super Bowl

Posted on January 30, 2013 by AnnieRie

I knew somewhere I had pictures of a raven. It took a while to find them. They were taken five years ago on our trip to wine country. Who knew? I had to fly to San Francisco to take pictures of the Baltimore mascot.

While out there, we took a ride down the coast and found quite a few birds. Seeing a raven up close, and seeing my crows who live in the yard, the difference becomes noticeable. The raven featured in my header through the rest of this week has that shaggy throat, is very large and has the slight difference in beak curvature.

Compare them to my backyard crows.

Now, back to deciding where we are going and what we are making for the Super Bowl. I do know there will be venison chili, from my stash of venison in the freezer.

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A Perfect Place for a Winter Hike

Posted on January 29, 2013 by AnnieRie

We went hiking today. In perfect weather. We were shedding vests and jackets and loving the temperatures that climbed into the 60s this afternoon. All the snow has melted. Except for a few places where the sun doesn’t touch. Out at the Howard County Conservancy, our last winter hike took place this morning.

The strollers got to find the first skunk cabbage up near the East Branch on the Conservancy grounds. Also found a few last milkweed pods. And listened to the woodpeckers up in the trees.

The other “fitness hikers” took off behind Ann, their leader to find the champion tulip poplar on the property. There is a geocache located there for those into discovery using the GPS units.

We watched them coming down the hills on their way back to the Conservancy.

The birds were out in force today, flitting from trees to bushes. I startled half a dozen bluebirds, some Carolina wrens, lots of sparrows, a few woodpeckers and nuthatches. We heard the pileated woodpeckers but couldn’t find them. They were hiding, not coming to visit like they did for me last November.

After our hike, we went to hear Ned Tillman talk about the geology of Mt. Pleasant, and then enjoyed soup and salad for lunch. Lunch provided by one of the supporters of the Conservancy, REI. The Conservancy knows how to keep their volunteers happy. Let us roam around outdoors, come in for some enriching lectures and feed us well.

Here’s to more time spent enjoying the scenery.

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Heard Around the Water Cooler

Posted on January 21, 2013 by AnnieRie

aka The Bird Bath. I think that my neighborhood birds are all excited that the Ravens won.

They were gathering in earnest today at the bird bath. They also decided the buffet in my yard must have been worth the visit.

These are just the robins and starlings that descended upon us this morning. And, only a fraction of them. There were more out back and in the meadow. My neighbor’s crab apple trees are the big draw along with my heated bird bath. I think this “discussion” is about why the Cardinals didn’t do so well this year, and what they think of the 49ers.

Add to all these new visitors, the red bellied woodpecker decided to chase away the finch from his favorite feeder.

But then he got all introspective and went off to contemplate whatever.

Just another day in West Howard County. Lunchtime entertainment.

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Rearranging the Habitat

Posted on January 14, 2013 by AnnieRie

And driving the birds nuts. They don’t like change. They were not happy when everything came down while they did crown cleaning of our maple tree. When I put it all back up, I had moved things around.

I got a new witches hat at Mother Nature’s the other day. Plus, I wanted to protect the suet better. And, I found a new nugget and peanut feeder to replace my gnarly looking old one. Birds don’t like change, as I said. The downy woodpeckers had to take time to figure out how to get onto this new one.

This young downy launched herself at least a half dozen times before figuring it out. She did finally get there. Don’t worry. It isn’t a girl thing. Her brother had just as much trouble. These are two new young woodpeckers that live in my yard somewhere. With their parents. I watched all four of them this summer. Mama very protective while the younguns were learning. Mom and Dad are not afraid of me. The younguns still are.

See, she did figure it out. Besides her, the young newest generation of red bellied woodpeckers took no time to get back here and find his favorite feeders. Even though they all moved around.

He’s up in the tree here, but came down to the suet and to the sunflower/safflower/peanut mix in my left most feeder. He nails that feeder every morning now. He is also still very shy, and flies away immediately when I come out.

As for the blue jays, they are loving the peanuts. And, they have figured out how to hang on the side of the feeder with the spring loaded closing mechanism. Smart birds.

We have at least six blue jays. They are always chasing the hawks, and they definitely know the sound of the top of the feeder closing. The “jay jay” call goes out immediately after I finish filling feeders and flinging peanuts in the shell.

As for smart birds, we now have three crows here. They love me, as I do the peanuts. I can now take their picture. They will fly away the instant my husband appears in the window. He has to start feeding them and make them happy to see him. Besides, they look almost like Ravens, don’t they?

The crows are our alarm clock in the morning. As are the squirrels who think it is cool to jump from our cherry tree onto our roof and run across it early in the morning. Living in a Cape Cod, our roof line does run right across us on my side of the bed. It sounds like an army when they chase each other across there. They love the new location of the corn feeders. They can munch right from the tree. No sweat. No real acrobatics.