Tag: birds
-
Hungry Hummer Can’t Wait
By Wednesday night, we’d had four inches of rain on Green Mountain, and the birds were cold, wet and hungry. The hummingbirds seemed especially desperate, as I suspect that all that rain has diluted the nectar in the flowers. The hummers were haunting our feeders, which I noticed, actually had more liquid in them than…
-
It must be spring…
… the turkey vultures are back! As large birds, turkey vultures depend on thermals to work themselves up to as high as 10,000 feet to search for carrion (dead animals). Once aloft, they fly with their wingtips splayed out finger-like for better flight control while soaring. Because they need warm air to lift them, you’ll…
-
Gorgeous Great-Tailed Grackles
We had a small flock of great-tailed grackles make a stop in the back yard this fall. I don’t usually think of grackles as beautiful. Loud, yes. Messy, sure. But these birds were gorgeous. Two-tone iridescent blue on their heads, bronze on their backs and purple on their wings. They must have all been males,…
-
Birds flee drought areas
I have seen more different birds at my feeders than I ever have before in the summer. In addition to the usual house sparrows, house finches, American and lesser goldfinches, mourning and collared doves, house wrens and dramatic raids by Cooper’s hawks, we’ve had white-crowned nuthatches, chickadees, spotted towhees and black-headed grosbeaks – birds that…
-
Hummers Are Back
Hummingbirds are back! I was alerted to a hummer at our feeder by a distinctive ringing zip overhead. All hummers make a buzzing or humming sound that gives the birds their name, but only one hummer makes that metallic zip sound: A male broad-tailed hummingbird. A male broad-tailed hummingbird has an iridescent green back and…
-
Bald Eagles Over Littleton, Colorado
My daughter and I were at the Littleton REI on South Wadsworth this spring, when she looked up and pointed. “An eagle!” In Littleton? Disbelieving, I looked and squinted at the bird. It was big, and dark. It held it’s wings flat. And then it banked and the sun flashed off it’s head and tail. …
-
Coopers Hawk Misses Dinner
It was an cold and wet weekend. Pouring rain alternated with a light drizzle, and the temperature hovered in the mid-fifties. Perfect weather to suck the warmth right out of your bones.You could tell the little brown birds – sparrows, finches, goldfinches and a few chickadees – were feeling the weather. Probably twenty little birds…
Amy Law, Science Geek 