Feeding the birds

 Last Thursday, while on our snowshoe hike into the wilderness, I fed one of the gray jays from my hand. These cheeky birds will land right next to you and even try to snatch food from your lunch, so this picture is really not all that unusual. You don't leave anything laying around or it will be carried off. Notice he's got one of my almonds in his beak (click to enlarge).

Nevertheless, it was an interesting feeling to have the bird use my hand as a perch. They are strong, you can feel it in those feet. One posed for me on a hiking pole. You can see the direction of the wind in his feathers. He is beautiful, isn't he? Or is it she?

At home I feed the birds and have a constant battle to keep the squirrels from the bird food. I've found that I can distract the squirrels for a few minutes, even an hour, by placing peanuts in strategic places outside near the big tree. They will spend their time burying them -- I guess you could say squirreling them away. I haven't seen any sign of the black squirrels lately, but maybe the gray ones told them to get out of town, this is OUR territory. Whatever, I prefer the black ones because they are much less common. In any event, they vie for the same food as my birds. These squirrels are not underfed; in fact, the oldest one actually waddles and (ooops! gotta go yell at him for a minute) is a preferred guest to some apartment residents.

I can spend hours looking out my front window watching them. One house sparrow had an injury and has a broken wing, but he flies just fine. He must have learned to adapt. I can spot him right away because he has a bunch of white feathers sticking out right at the base of the wing, and that wing hangs lower than the other. I can't see any problem when he flies away.

Don't tell the squirrels, but I even enjoy watching them. I thought they were eating the bird food on the porch and not letting the birds get any, but I just watched a whole batch of juncos, sparrows, and goldfinch put it all away with no help from the squirrels! Feeding the birds has become a very important part of my life. Just for fun, I took this picture and downloaded it a few minutes ago, taken through the front window. I leave some seed on the porch here because the juncos won't go up to the feeders, and there are a lot of them at this time of the year. In the picture you can see goldfinch and sparrows, and I'm looking out now at the juncos, even though there aren't any here.

Gotta go, the squirrels are calling! :-)