Last week we had a yard full of rose-breasted grosbeaks until we did not.

Goodbye grosbeaks!

At one point, I counted at least 7 milling around our feeders and in the yard. My husband even set up his hunting blind in the backyard so I could try for better pictures. (Most my pictures are through the glass on the back door.)

And then by Wednesday, perhaps Thursday, I noticed I didn’t see them any longer.  Come back anytime grosbeaks! We’ll be here.

A Different Bluebird of Happiness

Feeling a bit glum about the disappearance of “my” grosbeaks and a yucky weather week, I went for a walk on our one sunny day. Drove myself to a park full of trails where I often see little bluebirds of happiness. Usually right as I turn the bend into this tree lined area here:

I did see bluebirds around the bend but not the Eastern bluebirds I usually find. Wow, you are a very blue bird indeed!

While I was fairly sure I’d spotted an indigo bunting, I did consult my bird book at home. My youngest son helped me look and compare (I toyed with the idea it might be a blue grosbeak as well) and we’ve decided yes, I did spot a male indigo bunting on my walk. They’d certainly be welcome in my backyard any time as well as the grosbeaks.

A New Hello at Home

It’s baby season in the backyard.

It’s no secret the house sparrows annoy me with their “suet feeder school” (They’ve now also taught a starling these skills along with the blue jay from last week.) However, the little baby sparrows are quite cute and fluffy.

And so are the babies of my regular backyard residents, the house finches. I’ve been quite enamored with this little one:

Makes me smile. The little gray cat, not so much. She doesn’t care and these birds distract me from my more important duties like showering her with constant attention (until she’s tired of it).

Why do you want to watch birds when you could be petting me?

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Other birds spotted this week: a nuthatch, downy woodpeckers, red-bellied woodpeckers, robins, bluejays, cardinals, grackles, brown-headed cowbirds (though not as many thank goodness!), starlings, goldfinch, and my white-crowned sparrow (he also disappeared it seems about the same time as the grosbeaks). Oh, and turkey vultures plus maybe a killdeer (not sure, far away in tall grass) at the park.

Joining in with the Bird Depot hosted by Anni over at I’d Rather B Birdin’.

Happy World Migratory Bird Day! It’s been slow around here so far this morning but yesterday was exciting. This week brought a few new and exciting birds to our yard. Some of our “old” birds learned new tricks. And we even had a garden rescue!

First to show this week. A new one for our yard! And believe it or not, the reason I started feeding the birds. Who knew it would be so hard to attract these little birds…

GOLD FINCH!

Some credit must go to the Tractor Supply store as I’ve bought these little white bags of food previously at other stores with no luck. Right away, I noticed I could actually smell this stuff as I put it out. So perhaps my other food was stale. I don’t know. However, the very next day I had a gold finch on it!

The above photo might have been better had some nitwit realized they left their camera on close-up mode a bit sooner. Anyway, this little goldfinch departed and returned with friends! Just one more because this fellow is handsome!

Also, showing up in our backyard: A White-Crowned Sparrow and a pair of Rose-Breasted Grosbeaks!

Let me apologize in advance as these photos aren’t the best quality but the Rose-breasted grosbeaks is another first for us! 

And it certainly was strange when my husband happened to be watching a show about Alaska and they showed footage of the white-crowned sparrows just after I’d seen one. He really needs to get a move on. It’s bit late for him to be hanging around here.

New Skills From A Blue jay!

Not sure if the house sparrows are running a secret school teaching other birds about how to manage the suet feeder but this happened yesterday morning:

And Now, A Garden Rescue Story!

It’s nesting season around our backyard. And garden season. We finally tilled our garden last Saturday. A pair of cardinals likes to nest under the gutter curve near the garden. Not a great spot but certainly better than the boxwood bush by the front porch. I finally succeeded in getting them to move away from that sight.

On Sunday, I was walking around surveying the garden work and noticed what looked like a bird embryo on top of the dirt. Hoping we hadn’t done something to harm it with our tilling, I returned inside to grab something to remove it and mentioned it to my husband.

Windblown cardinal

He said he’d seen an egg there the previous night. We’ve had some super windy days so were not sure whether it blew out of the nest or someone evicted it. A concern of mine considering the run of brown headed cowbirds around here lately.

As I returned to it with two paper bowls, it moved! My husband scooped it up and returned it to the nest. Later, mama returned. And just yesterday, the baby bird remained still getting care from the mama bird. Sadly, the other egg in the nest had a hole in it and never hatched.

Fingers crossed mama cardinal is raising an actual cardinal and not a darn brown headed cowbird. We’ll know in time, I suppose.

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Joining the Bird Depot hosted by Anni of I’d Rather B Birdin’.