Gardening by Mistake

After having left the feeders empty all summer, I put food out about 2 weeks ago. Although the birds have visited the feeders since then, today it seems the entire neighborhood has stopped by. In the past hour I’ve had a feisty Carolina wren, a house wren, a male house finch and two of his chicks, a female cardinal and her female chick, a blue jay (juvenile, I believe), a male goldfinch, and a Carolina black-capped chickadee stop by. And a downy woodpecker was checking out the apples on the tree nearby.  And these are just the birds I know of!

Out in the garden, the dogwood shrub is hosting a great many birds who find its berries to be irresistible.

When I checked the yard, I found even more activity: a wren family, a robin family, a grackle family, and a brown thrasher were all busily moving around my back yard.

Update: not long after, a hummingbird dropped by the feeding station to check it out. I don’t have any hummingbird feeders. He investigated a tube feeder out there that has maroon perches. I was sorry I didn’t have something for him.

I’d never seen a flicker before this past winter when I started putting out lots of bird foods. We had a male and a female flicker visit us throughout the winter. Just recently I saw an adult flicker with a fledgling. They were on the driveway. The fledgling hopped around, seemingly randomly, while the parent worked its way along the edge of the grass; I saw it feeding the fledgling multiple times.

I’d like to think that my efforts at starling removal this past winter had a role to play in that fledgling flicker.

The house wrens have fledged and the nest box is now empty. I haven’t seen any signs of the little fledglings in the garden. I do hope they are there because they eat a tremendous amount of bugs. I’d love their free pest control!

I did bring the nest box in. This weekend we’ll clean it out before hanging it again, ready for a new family. I’m putting it in a different location this next time. I imagine I’ll end up with house wrens again—probably the same pair—but I’d like to try for a different kind of bird.

The other day some noise prompted me to look out the window to the feeding station. I saw a male and a female cardinal, confronting each other:

I wish I had video of it because the pictures don’t do a good job of showing it. As you can see from the above picture, the female is not feeling friendly. The male was raised up and leaning forward and his feathers all flat and his mouth opening and closing threateningly. The picture can’t show that he held his wings close to his body but fluttering.  They were in this standoff for several long seconds and then, without any visible warning, the male cardinal launched himself at the female. She jumped out of his way and then they became a brief whirlwind of fighting activity. The camera was too slow to capture all of this.

I have no idea what prompted this. I’ve never seen anything like it before.

The other day I think I mentioned that a brown thrasher chased a dove away from a feeder and then helped himself to seed. I was surprised by that. I was surprised to see him quite aggressively run off the dove, and I was surprised that he then ate seed.

(With the same apology as with the grosbeak and oriole pictures, these were taken in a hurry through a screened window in need of cleaning. They are not as clear as I’d like).

I was also happy to see the dove sneak back once the thrasher was occupied on the other side of the feeder.

Brown thrasher sharing the feeder with the dove.

In the space of about 5 minutes today I added two new birds to my list of those visiting my feeding station. I couldn’t believe it.

I’m not certain I have these identified correctly, so I’m hoping others can either confirm their identities or tell me the correct ones.

I want to say that I had very little time to get these pictures. They were taken, in haste, through a screened window which really needs to be cleaned.  That’s unfortunate. Maybe I’ll have another chance to take their pictures at a later time.

This bird is, I think, a Baltimore Oriole. He was here for only a second and didn’t move around for me to get views of him from all sides.

This bird is the one which really perplexes me. I believe it is the black-headed grosbeak but it has the chest markings of a rose-breasted grosbeak but the head markings of a black-headed. It has the coloring of the black-headed but we’re not in the black-headed grosbeak’s range. The color around its neck and breast is orange. The third picture shows it best and while blurry, it is accurate as to color. At best we’re in the “rare” sightings category. That alone should point to it being a rose-breasted. I sure hope someone can tell me what it is!

It’s about time, I know, to be getting done with spring tasks. I pruned all but a half dozen or so rose bushes now. As I was pruning today, I discovered a third robin’s nest. That’s 6 nests that I know of in my yard so far this year! I imagine we’ll have two more once we get the kids’ nest boxes hung up outside.

I tried to do some weeding but the ground is too wet. (Since Monday we’ve had about 3 1/2 inches of rain). Clumps of mud were coming up with the roots. I hate that I have the time and the mood and the nice weather but I can’t weed. Who knows when those factors will all align again!

I’m debating on how to proceed with some of my aster oblongifolius.  These are winter sown babies. They need to be separated from their clump in the pot and given new homes. I’d planned on potting them up individually, but now that I’m looking at them, I’m thinking about planting them directly into the garden. Planting directly into the garden idea is more appealing since it removes a step. The advantage to growing them on a bit in their own pots is that they could achieve more size before being left to fend for themselves. Of course, in the spirit of my Darwinian gardening philosophy, I don’t have to worry about the plants anyway. I think they’ll go directly into the garden. Maybe even tonight! (Now I just have to figure out where I’m going to put them!)

I got a picture of the wren entering the nest box:

I’ve discovered my 5th nest in the rose garden area of my yard. This includes the now defunct cardinal nest, the 2 robin nests, and the grackle nest.

This winter my daughter asked her grandfather if they could do some sort of building project. I asked for a nest box for bluebirds. (I’d also like a bat house, but I didn’t think that would be as appealing to my daughter.) My son said he wanted to help, too. So my dad bravely undertook this challenge. I ended up with a very nice nest box made from plans offered by the Missouri Department of Conservation. (I couldn’t find them quickly on the MDC website right now, but here’s a plan from the MDC).  I was slow getting the nest box hung, so I was quite sure I wouldn’t get a bluebird family. The question was, would I get any at all? I’ve watched and watched the box. Nothing. That’s better than having it adopted by house sparrows, but still disappointing. And then this morning, I discovered it has a house wren family. (I didn’t get close enough to be 100% certain, but I’m maybe 80% sure that’s what it is. My camera’s zoom lens will help me out later so I can tell without disturbing them). Wrens are insect eaters, so I’m hoping they help themselves to the non-beneficial bugs in the garden.

Even though from what I’ve read the house wren is the most likely native bird to take a nest box, I’m still happy to have them there. They are a small bird but they have a big song. I think, however, that I may try the box in a different location next year to see if I can get a titmouse or chickadee or some other bird family (assuming I don’t get a bluebird family). In the meantime, I’ll enjoy the many birds still coming to my feeders (grackles aside) and their songs as I’m in the garden.

Although the cardinal nest ended in a complete loss of eggs, I have discovered two robin nests. One is unfortunately located in the lonicera japonica (Japanese honeysuckle vine) that I’m trying to kill. Obviously, my murder efforts will be in abeyance until the nest empties. The other nest is about 50 feet away, on the same fence but inside a tangle of Virginia creeper. In both cases, I’m hoping that when the babies fledge and leave the nest that they do so on the rose garden side of the fence. The other side of the fence is near certain death in the form of both dogs. The grackles, unfortunately, have set up another nest, although this year it’s in the tree next to last year’s. Last year once the babies fledged, the grackles took turns strafing me, a one-bird mob, trying to run me off. It didn’t work, but it sure left both the grackles and me highly irate. (I did learn that walking backward as I left the garden kept the birds from flying as close to me, thank goodness). Once the babies were independent juveniles, the entire family would sit on the nearby powerlines and scold me the entire time I was out there. Can’t say I’m looking forward to a repeat, but it appears one is in the future.

I’ve added a new bird to my list: the white-crowned sparrow. From what I read, this is one of the most recognized sparrows, so it’s funny that it’s new to me. This is the first I’ve seen of them. There are a handful hanging around my yard. I read that they winter down here and nest in the far north. It’s clearly not winter here, so I guess they are migrating. They’d better get a move on, if they want to have time to nest. I’ll be curious to see how long they hang around.

Our weather has been quite cool yesterday and today, and today it’s also cloudy. That’s the only explanation I have for the fact that many birds have suddenly started visiting my bird feeders again. All of my feeders were pretty much empty except for the nyjer sock and one other feeder. So many birds came by looking for food today, that I went out and filled all the feeders. It wasn’t even 2 minutes after I did this that a male cardinal swooped in and helped himself.