The baby Barred Owls, Sarah and Percy, are taking turns sitting in the nest box hole. In this case, they both squeezed into the hole for a look outside. Truly their days remaining in the box are numbered. Best enjoy the view in the nest with the owl box cam while you can! blog.wbu.com
Sarah and Percy Check out the woods!
The owlets Sarah and Percy are growing up and are very active. One of them actually sat in the hole looking out at the big world 2 days ago! This means they are but a few days away from leaving the box permanently. Enjoy the show while you can! http://blog.wbu.com
Last night we watched the owl box from our deck as both parents were calling to each other from different parts of the woods. We could see the top of one of the owlets head as it tried to look outside at the big world and find its parents. It won’t be long until they leave the box and finish maturing outside of the box just living in the trees. The parents will feed them all summer and we will be able to hear them calling their special hissing sound all summer.
Baby owls Sarah and Percy are now over 3 weeks old and are growing rapidly. Since the weather is also warmer, they are mostly left alone in the nest while their parents hunt and bring food to the nest box. They will likely be in the box for just about 7 to 10 more days and then leave the box to continue growing up all summer in our backyard.
Another one of my favorite spring rituals is rapidly approaching.
It’s time to retrieve the feeder from the garden shed, buy an extra bag of sugar and dig the nectar bottle out from the back of the cabinet. My Ruby-throated Hummingbirds will be back in town any day now!
I have been jealously tracking its invasion of the southeastern states for the past month by viewing a very cool web site (Journey North) that uses citizen reports to map out the Ruby-throated Hummingbird’s migration.
It tells me that they are getting close! And according to my records…they are right on schedule!
For seventeen years I have gone through the ritual of hanging my nectar feeders up on April 1st in hopes of glimpsing my FOY (first of the year) hummingbird. Some may say it is foolish…but I have always been rewarded with a sighting within the first 10 days of the month.
Bird banding studies have shown that hummingbirds are creatures of habit. They have been found returning to the same nesting territory and migrating along the exact same route year after year. Some have even been recorded visiting the same feeder on the same date during multiple migrations.
So I figure it would be foolish not to put my feeder out now.
It sure wouldn’t be nice to pull an April fools trick on a hungry hummingbird that is making a return trip through my yard expecting to find a feeder!
I would love to hear your FOY hummingbird sightings and how early you put up your feeder in your location. Please click the Leave a Comment » bar at the top right corner of this page and share your stories.
You can bet that I will be watching my feeders this weekend! And unlike any other weekend of the year, I will be taking names and making notes about each of my feeder friends…at least the ones with feathers!
You see…this is the week of the Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC) which starts Friday (2/18) and goes through Monday. This unique event, now in its 14th year, creates an instantaneous snapshot of birdlife across the U.S. and Canada for all to see.
The four-day count typically records more than 10 million observations and as a result of this vast amount of data, ornithologists are able to answer questions such as:
• How did this winter’s severe weather influence bird populations?
• Where did the “irruptive” northern finch species end up this winter?
• Is this year’s bird migration occurring earlier or later than in previous years?
• Are their any species showing trends towards significant declines in population?
It’s good stuff and I am proud to play a part in it every year and I invite you to do the same. But since there are too many of you to have over to my house this weekend…may I suggest that you start by simply watching and counting birds in your own yard, a nearby park, or maybe at a school.
You can find all the details on how to participate at the GBBC web site.
This event is coordinated by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Audubon, and Bird Studies Canada and I am proud to say that Wild Birds Unlimited has provided the sponsorship for the GBBC since its beginning.
So where are the irruptive winter finches showing up? Check out the current www.eBird.org map sightings. Maybe they’re in your neighborhood.
Click here to find where Pine Siskin are being seen. Also, check out the More Than We Thought post where you can learn some identification clues for quickly telling if there are Pine Siskin on your feeder.
Click here to see Common Redpolls’ strong movement into the Northeast, Great Lakes, Seattle areas and other isolated pockets.
Click here to see Purple Finch throughout the East, West coast states and other areas. Be careful with your ID. Purple, House and Cassin’s Finches can be challenging to tell apart. Check out this great tricky finch identification resource from Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s Project FeederWatch.
It’s not like this time of year is not busy enough! Office parties, gift searching, family gatherings, travel to grandma’s house…it has become a marathon effort to survive the holidays!
Every year I pledge that I am going to simplify my life to have more time with family and friends and more time pursuing my bird related hobbies.
If you’re living in the same world as me…does the phrase “fat chance” immediately come to mind?
But in the spirit of the season, I have a holiday tip for you that really works: grab your friends and relatives and go participate in a Christmas Bird Count!
Whether you are a first time bird watcher or an experienced pro, you can help with tallying the birds in your area. The bird sightings that you provide will allows researchers and conservation biologists to study the long-term health and status of bird populations across North America.
And besides that…it’s a lot of fun, too!
Except for getting up so early on a Saturday!
But even that was a treat last weekend as I arose at the crack of dawn to participate in our local bird count. It was a gorgeous day…cloudless blue skies, a brilliant snow covered landscape and the sunrise was not to be missed!
It was a relaxing, wonderful day spent outside with close family, good friends and great birds! It just doesn’t get any better than that!
To find a Christmas Bird Count in your area go the National Audubon Society’s web site at: http://birds.audubon.org/christmas-bird-count
I thought I would share an excellent TV interview with Ben Roush, owner of the Ft. Wayne, Indiana Wild Birds Unlimited. Ben’s store is a great example of what is offered at Wild Birds Unlimited stores across North America!
http://www.indianasnewscenter.com/insight/inlife/INside-Wild-Birds-Unlimited-for-the-holidays-111058394.html?vid=a
Fall is one of my favorite times of year to head into the wilderness. The earthy smells, the crisp air, the crunch of leaves, squirrels squeakily chewing on tree nuts and cones, birds flitting around foraging for insects and seeds quietly talking to each other with single-note calls.
Now, we do our fair share of camping. But, we haven’t done much wilderness camping. So, I figured it was time to introduce my kids to this favorite pastime through backpacking. But first, they needed to be introduced to the mountains and what to expect.
What better way and time to do it then in the Great Smoky Mountains with the autumn leaf show. So, we packed up the van and headed out to day-hike part of the Appalachian Trail (AT) in the Great Smokey Mountain National Park.
The whole scene was gorgeous with mountain streams and waterfalls, bears preparing for winter, listening to and watching Dark-eyed Juncos, Black-capped Chickadees, Tufted Titmice, White-breasted Nuthatches, Downy Woodpeckers, Brown Creepers, Pileated Woodpeckers and more.
We visited an AT shelter. This was one of the nicest shelters I have ever seen. It even had a privy; what luxury for a backpacker! There was a watering hole just down the trail and they didn’t balk at it.
Some very memorable highlights included flushing a Roughed Grouse, my son hearing a Barred Owl so far away, even I missed it at first, and a Northern Waterthrush serenading us as we departed the mountains following a stream on the last day.
I think they are ready for our big mountain wilderness backpacking trip for next Spring. Time to start planning.
I just might talk a bit about some of our new innovative products at Wild Birds Unlimited, and if my arm is twisted real hard I might also muse a bit about my namesake product, Jim’s Birdacious Bark Butter, and a few new items that are soon to be introduced in this line.
I’ll apologize ahead of time, as I don’t expect to have time to reply to comments posted on my blog, but certainly will enjoy reading your comments and postings.
Enjoy your birds!
Jim Carpenter
Founder, President & CEO
Wild Birds Unlimited
