Walk in the Woods, Spring is in the Air!

Jim and I took a walk in the woods this morning and it was the first time this year that it really felt like spring was on its way!  Our Eastern Bluebirds are going in and out of the bird houses daily and yesterday a male was singing from the top of one of them.  They are one of the first songbirds to nest in our area and they are definitely getting ready.  We also found a Cooper’s Hawk in the same area that it nested last year.  The nest did not appear to have any new additions to it but chances are the bird we saw was already on “territory”.

If you want to attract nesting birds to your yard now is the time to start putting up those bird houses and/or cleaning out your existing houses.  Some birds won’t be back for another month or two but others are returning now and some begin nesting immediately.   Not all bird houses are created equal, some are so small that only a wren will use them, others may not have enough ventilation or drainage and will get too hot or too wet.   Placement is also important depending on the type of birds who will use the house.  Some will nest in almost any location, others prefer a wooded area, yet others need wide open spaces.  Some birds will only nest and not visit your feeders, so providing a house may attract birds to your yard you may not otherwise see.  Plus watching all their courtship and feeding of the young can be very entertaining!

Hope you all can enjoy a little bit of spring today!

Connecticut Songbird Rehabilitator Fundraiser Information

Jayne is the person we refer people to most often when they call with an injured bird.  She has dedicated her life to helping song birds and this event is her major fundraiser of the year.  If you can’t attend but still want to offer support please go to her web site or call her at the number below.  www.mvssanctuary.org

If you are reading this but don’t live in CT please consider helping your local rehabilitator.

Mount Vernon Songbird Sanctuary
5th Annual Fundraiser
Dinner and silent/live auction
With Emcee Damon Scott from 96.5 TIC radio

Sunday, March 28, 2010
1:00 - 5:00 pm
Aqua Turf Club
Mulberry Road
Plantsville, Ct

Who they are - Mount Vernon Songbird Sanctuary is a non - profit charitable organization, founded and run by Jayne Amico with the help of a dedicated group of volunteers. We are based in Central Connecticut on 4 1/2 acres of beautiful songbird habitat. The Sanctuary has a rehabilitation area with a small building and three flight cages, a pavilion with attached chimney that provide a nesting site for the declining chimney swifts and barn swallows, along with extensive gardens, natural areas with native plants,a pond, feeding station with waterfall, and wooded, open and early successional habitat.

What they do -Mount Vernon Songbird Sanctuary strictly specializes in caring for small migratory songbirds. We focus our expertise on insectivores with greatest conservation needs, including warblers, flycatchers, chimney swifts and all swallow species. We also care for woodpeckers, hummingbirds, waxwings, grosbeaks, orioles, tanagers, kingfishers, woodcock, snipe and killdeer.

$55.00 per person

to pay by mail, send checks to;
Mount Vernon Songbird Sanctuary
1024 Mount Vernon Rd
Southington CT 06489

to pay by phone (credit card), call;
860.276.8433

Learning Bird Song

It may only be February, but what better way to spend your daily trips back and forth to work than by listening to bird song?  If you were to start now, by the time migration rolls around you’d be ready!  There are many species of birds that we hardly ever see but we hear all the time.  One of the best tools for learning bird song is a series of CD’s by Peterson.  The most popular one is Birding by Ear, a 3 CD set for $30.  If you are really new to birding and can’t identify even the most common birds then you should start with Backyard Bird Song.  For those most interested in warblers, More Birding By Ear has the largest number.    We carry all three in the store and on the web (as well as Western Birding by Ear).  They may not have ALL the birds, but for learning they are the best!  If you are just looking for a reference CD, then the Stokes series would be the ticket, also carried in the store and on the web.

Snow!

As many as 20 states are under a winter storm warning or watch so I am sure many of you reading this are effected!  Here in southern, CT we are in for anywhere from 9 to 13 inches (at least that is what they are saying right now).   It will be a tough day for all creatures great and small including our feathered and furry friends.  If you have time to fill your feeders before the storm hits your area all the better for you and the birds.  I hope many of you will be able to stay home and enjoy the beauty of the snow and at the same time enjoy the birds.  Don’t forget, this weekend is also the Great Backyard Bird Count - it should shape up to be a great one.

The Great Backyard Bird Count is just around the corner!

The Great Backyard Bird Count is an annual four-day event that is for bird watchers of all ages!  The idea is to count birds you see in a given area to create a real-time snapshot of where the birds are across the continent and in Hawaii.   Anyone can participate, from beginning bird watchers to experts.  It takes as little as 15 minutes on one day, or you can count for as long as you like each day of the event.  It’s free, fun, and easy—and it helps the birds.  The dates for this year’s event are Friday February 12, through Monday February 15th.  For more information go to http://www.birdsource.org/gbbc/  and download the forms.  This year celebrates the 13th annual GBBC a project of  Cornell lab of Ornithology, National Audubon Society and Bird Studies Canada.   What a great way to spend a cold February weekend!

Rain and Bird Seed

If you live in just about any part of the country you either had snow or rain recently!  Jim and I just returned from a birding/photo trip to southern California and the rain we had there ended up here in CT on Monday.  With the driving wind and rain, many bird feeders will need to be emptied and the seed discarded.  If the seed is just wet it is fine to place on the ground for the ground feeding birds but if it got moldy you will need to place it in the trash.

Niger (thistle) seed feeders should always be checked after a rain.  The seed is so small and it gets compacted easily which makes it hard for the birds to get the seed out.  The thistle “socks” and mesh feeders have the most problems when it rains.  Also if you used shelled sunflower or shelled peanuts (like I do), you almost always need to dump the feeders after a heavy rain, even if you use rain guards.

Happy birding!

Hawks & Bird Feeding

It is not uncommon for us to get calls from people wondering what they can do to prevent hawks from attacking birds in their backyards.  It is true that some hawks find bird feeding stations the best place to hang out since there are usually higher concentrations of birds there than in other areas.  The most common hawks in our area that prey on songbirds are the Sharp-shin and Coopers Hawks.  These are accipiters (a type of hawk) that specialize in feeding on birds.  They will often go after the slower birds which are usually the older and sicker birds as well as the “dumb” birds who don’t heed the call of the jay when it squawks to alert of danger.   It is part of nature although one many of us would prefer not to watch.  These birds are not like cats who hunt whether or not they are hungry (we love our indoor cats!), hawks only hunt to eat.  To keep the playing field even, try to keep areas of cover for the birds that are coming to your feeders.  A bush nearby or brush pile can help them when a predator is in the area.  Hawks are beautiful birds that are often misunderstood, try to enjoy them!

Eastern Bluebirds Coming to Dried Mealworms!

We are fortunate to have Bluebirds nest in our yard.  Periodically they will visit during the winter months so last year we started feeding them dried mealworms and they stayed all winter.  This year they showed up about a week ago so we began feeding them the dried mealworms again.  (In the summer we feed live meal worms, they don’t seem particularly interested in the dried ones in the summer).  Below is a link to a video Jim took at our house a couple of days ago of the Bluebirds eating from a Bluebird feeder on our deck railing.  Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHHAIWQOFz4

Discarded Christmas Trees make Great shelter for birds!

Don’t put your live Christmas tree in the trash, put it near your feeding station to give the birds shelter!  You can tie it to your deck - an area that often does not have good cover nearby but is used more frequently in the winter for easy access to feeders.  The more shelter you create for the birds, the more birds you will attract.  Don’t use a live tree yourself?  One of your neighbors probably do and I am sure they wouldn’t mind you taking it off their hands!

Snowy Owl Rings in New Year

Many birder’s start the year with a clean state for their “year list” so January first many go out looking for as many birds as possible to start the new year off with a bang!  Jim and I birded with friends along the CT shoreline around Milford and Stratford on New Year’s Day, although we don’t keep a year list it is always nice to start the year with some less common birds!  We were fortunate to have heard of a sighting of a Snowy Owl the day before at Milford Coastal Center and were even more fortunate to see it on New Year’s Day!  Almost every year a Snowy Owl or two show up along the shoreline in CT.   They prefer the jetty’s and other areas that are away from most of the beach and dog walkers.  They are from areas with little vegetation so open expanses of sand and rock are just fine for them.  Happy New Year everyone, hope your feeders are hopping with activity, the cold and snow here in the northeast has brought the birds back in good numbers from a lackluster fall feeding season.