Cardinal and Other Birds This Winter

Tags

blue jay, downy woodpecker, house finch, house sparrow, junco, northern cardinal, photography, postaday, tufted titmouse

Today skies are mostly sunny and snow is melting at a good pace. I took the opportunity to photograph the various birds that come to our feeder all day long.

Blue Jay, checking out the bird feeder. They rule the place and whenever they land, all other birds scatter away.

Blue Jay.

Junco about to jump.

Female Downy Woodpecker.

Female House Finch.

Male House Finch.

House Sparrow.

Tufted Titmouse, working on a sunflower seed.

Finally, the one and the only Northern Cardinal, resplendent in colors rivaling its human counterparts in Rome.

Northern Cardinal.

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Junco in Snow

Tags

junco, photography, postaday

Standing on snow that had piled up on top of our deck, these Juncos looked like toy birds.

Junco, 2014.

Junco, 2017.

Snow Storm

Tags

blue jay, junco, photography, postaday, tufted titmouse

Saturday was a cold and snowy day. Only one inch of snow was forecasted, but it kept snowing most of the day and in the end we got at least 3 inches. The poor birds sheltered among our magnolia branches, but only because they know I usually stock our feeder with sunflower seeds to the brim.

Junco.

Tufted Titmouse.

After it stopped snowing, as a special treat, I put out a tray of roasted peanuts to provide them with some energy food. Within a few minutes, Blue Jays appeared and swooped down to literally gorge themselves.

Blue Jay: “Hmm, maybe I can stuff all of these in my mouth!?”

Blue Jay: “If you must insist, I will try…”

Blue Jay, after at least four peanuts down its throat.

Cloudy Days

Tags

Holgate, house finch, junco, photography, postaday

Last week, there were two sightings of the Snowy Owl on the Jersey Shore, so yesterday I went to the southern tip of Long Beach Island to find and photograph it. After walking for almost four hours, I failed to find the visitor from the Artic. There were only Seagulls and some birds which flew by too fast for identification.

Juvenile Ring-billed Gull.

The above Ring-billed Gull had just walked out of a fairly large sea water pond on the beach. The pond banks, shaped by wind,looked intriguing.

Sea water pond on beach at southern end (Holgate section) of Long Beach Island.

Back home, it was cloudy today as the sun obstinately refused to come out. Our bird feeder, however, attracted the usual crowd of small birds, even after one of them was attacked and carried away by a hawk. I didn’t have a chance to capture the hawk, but here are some photos of the small birds.

Junco on magnolia branch.

House Finch on magnolia branch.

House Finch looking at bird feeder.

Need Help for Junco

Tags

junco, photography, postaday

Today I took a few photos of a Dark-eyed Junco that was coming to our bird feeder. It had its left wing slightly higher than its right one as you can see below.

Junco with wing problem.

A while later, I saw it at the bird feeder and took the following photo.

What is wrong with the left side of this Junco? Some kind of unusual growth? A broken wing?

It was moving, but not as fast as the other Juncos. It was eating. There was no blood that I could see. If you know what the problem is, and how we can help this bird, please comment and tell me what I should do.

Birds in Snowstorm

Tags

cardinal, junco, photography, postaday, starling

Yesterday’s snow brought many birds to our bird feeder. At one point I counted more than 20 juncos perched on it and on the nearby magnolia branches. However, as usual, the cardinals stole the show with their brilliant colors.

Male Cardinal and Juncos

Male Cardinal

Female Cardinal

Dark-eyed Junco

One lonely starling also came by.

Starling

Cardinals. Brothers?

Move Over

Tags

downy woodpecker, junco, photography, postaday

It was snowing, and a Downy Woodpecker was dining by himself.

Downy Woodpecker at bird feeder.

Out of nowhere, an aggressive Junco flew in and chased it away from its perch.

Junco chasing Downy Woodpecker.

A fraction of a second later, this is what it looked like.

Junco landing and Downy Woodpecker trying to grab on at new position.

 

Those Juncos

Tags

junco, photography, postaday

Those Juncos are at it again. In the winter, many of them cluster around the bird feeder, and they will chase each other away at the slightest provocation. I haven’t been able to find out why since there is plenty of food and feeding perches.

Juncos food fight

Juncos food fight

Three Regular Visitors

Tags

cardinal, junco, photography, postaday

Even though it was still fairly cold, the sun was out today, allowing me to take advantage of the good light falling on three regular visitors to our bird feeder.

Junco

Male Cardinal

Female Cardinal

Yawn and Other Birds

Tags

cardinal, house finch, junco, magnolia, photography, postaday, sparrow

If you are getting bored of my BIF photos, this following picture, taken at Holgate two weeks ago, is for you.

Gull yawning

All right, so no more BIF today.

The other day, while trying to capture the Red-bellied Woodpecker in flight, I noticed our magnolia tree was getting loaded with birds.

Three Cardinals and one Sparrow

That was not the end of it. One more bird hopped on.

Three Cardinals, one Sparrow, one Junco

Then there was our House Finch next to a Junco.

House Finch and Junco

BIF (Birds in Flight) Attempts

Tags

BIF, chickadee, house finch, junco, photography, postaday, tufted titmouse

For a photographer, taking pictures of birds in flight (BIF) is probably the ultimate challenge. Birds fly very fast, they won’t wait for you, and you have little control on such matters as lighting and angles. You must shoot at very high speed, bump up the ISO, and just hope that your camera can meet those critical demands.

I have started to do BIF with the small birds around our bird feeder, as you can see in the following photos.

House Finch flying away as a Cardinal looks on

Tufted Titmouse arriving as a Chickadee is leaving

Two Juncos, one landing, the other taking off

 

Snowstorm – Beginning

Tags

bird feeder, cardinal, junco, photography, postaday

A major storm is beginning to fall in our area. It’s expected to become a blizzard with whiteout conditions. From inside the house, I took the following photos of the beautiful birds descending on our bird feeder to stock up for the next day or two, just like people going in and emptying store shelves.

Here are two cardinals looking and waiting for the right moment to fly to the bird feeder, only about 10 ft away from them.

Female Cardinal

Male cardinal

A typical scene at the bird feeder.

Juncos and Cardinal

Hawk!

Tags

cardinal, chicadee, cooper's hawk, junco, photography, postaday, red-bellied woodpecker

Another cold day as our bird feeder continues to be the gathering place for our feathered friends: juncos, chicadees, sparrows, tufted titmice, woodpeckers, cardinals, blue jays.

Cardinal and Chicadee

Red-bellied Woodpecker and Junco

Cardinal

Red-bellied Woodpecker

Suddenly all the birds flew up and scattered in every direction. A brown shape landed on our yellow magnolia tree. It was a Cooper’s Hawk. This was the first time I have been able to take photos of this bird of prey.

Cooper’s Hawk looking at bird feeder

Cooper’s Hawk, very intense

Cooper’s Hawk

The hawk stayed perched on a magnolia branch, gazing intently at the bird feeder, but all the medium and small birds had flown into hiding. After a couple of minutes, it gave up and flew back into the sky. It wasn’t until about half an hour later that our usual contingent of birds returned to our backyard.

Birds Up Close

Tags

canon sx50 hs, downy woodpecker, junco, photography, postaday, robin

This week, I acquired a Canon SX50 HS camera which can zoom from 24 mm to 1200 mm, or 50X. This camera is used by many bird photographers who cannot afford to buy those giant lenses, some costing as much as a second mortgage on a home.

I must say that the camera has lived up to its reputation. See for yourself in these three photos that I took over the past three days.

Here’s a junco, that came to partake of sunflower seeds I put out on our deck. I shot this through our glass patio door, but it is still very sharp.

Junco

Next is a robin, running on the grass near the Delaware Raritan Canal about 1.5 miles from home. We also have them in our backyard, but until now I haven’t been able to take as close a shot as this one.

Robin

Finally, here’s a nuthatch hanging upside down a tree trunk. I thought it was a female downy woodpecker, but Jet Elliot (see her comment below) pointed out my error. Thanks, Jet!

Downy Woodpecker

Frozen Magnolia Winter

Tags

chicadee, deer, junco, magnolia, photography, postaday, titmouse, winter

This winter has really been the coldest we have experienced. On some days, when I left the house to go to work, the temperature has been as low as -5 F (-24 C). I have had to replace my car battery one night, and the AAA man who came to replace it said they never ever had to replace so many batteries in one month.

Here’s a photo of a branch of our yellow magnolia tree encased in ice. I hope the flower buds will survive and bloom again this spring.

Magnolia in ice

The animals of course have to find food any way they can. I saw the deer below nib at one of our neighbor’s tree. If you look closely you’ll see that it has lost one of its antlers. This is normal, and the remaining one should fall off eventually. Around this time of the year, deer shed their antlers, which will regrow in the spring.

Deer with one antler.

I put out sunflower seeds and managed to take pictures of some cute birds.

Chicadee

Junco

Our backyard cardinals were not to be seen. Maybe they got offended by the post I wrote the other day.