Birrrdd! (אילו ציפורים)

When we moved into our apartment, one thing we discovered was a birdfeeder in the courtyard tended by one of the neighbors, who works at a bird feeding/birdwatcher's store.  Rudy made that courtyard his domain in many ways, as he loved being outdoors.  He would often grill steaks, vegetables, rouladen, chicken, and he would paint. He painted some abstract miniatures in complementary colors for the nursery. As is the way of the world, he and his wife had a baby, found the apartment  too small, and moved to a house in another neighborhood.  Morgan and I undertook  the upkeep of the feeder which, we learned,  was something Rudy had found there himself (we had always assumed it was his doing).  We continued offering a blend that Rudy's store sells that he developed in this very courtyard, we added a suet feeder and a plug feeder, and this year, I mostly rebuilt the shepherd's crook because it was leaning and I feared the landlady would deem it a nuisance.  On June 12, I decided it was time to make the birds pay for their board, and parked myself with a camera on a tripod, and a sketchbook at a table near the feeder and waited for some action.

Sparrows - who knew that there were people who cared enough about them to give them particular names?  Isn't "little brown bird" close enough?  Apparently not.  Sparrows are distinguishable, and some of them are even rare.  These House Sparrows, for example . . . are not.

This female perched on the shepherd's crook for a while but did not actually feed.  She flew from there to the ground and fed  there.  Her mate, on the other hand,  after taking soome seed from the seed feeder, paid a visit to the suet feeder, and made a few awkward attempts at the plug feeder, which is really for birds that can feed upside down; sparrows evidently cannot.  The black throat of the male is diagnostic of  the House Sparrow.


Here, a Hairy Woodpecker demonstrates the  correct use of the suet feeder, hanging upside down to feed.  His mate was calling loudly from a nearby tree when he wasn't feeding her food found at the feeder. Food is held for delivery in his beak.

As I sketched and photographed things that came to the feeder, Morgan observed him feeding his mate on the branch of the tree.


In William O'Brien State Parks, there are nestboxes distributed generously about.  They are used by a variety of birds.  Here we see House Wrens in action:


Off in search of nesting material:


As Morgan and I were walking throught Lake Maria State Park, this Green Heron landed on a marsh at which we had also observed some Trumpeter Swans.