The thread for birds and birding

[Proud2baLaker]

I need a mind cleanse in so many ways. This helps a little.

Today, a Red-breasted Nuthatch. Cool litte birds, nuthatches are commonly seen on tree branches and trunks searching the bark for food. They basically have internal stabilizers/gyroscopes and have no regard for which was is up or down and dont need to lean on their tail for support like woodpeckers do. They are native year round to mostly northern areas like the northeast US and all the way across Canada. But also hang out year round in the Rockies. The come down to lower elevations or the prairie areas of the US during the winter and you may see them at feeders at that time. They are cavity nesters of course and use resin from conifers around the entrance to the cavity to help keep out predators or other cavity nesters. The nuthatch will avoid the resin by just diving right through without perching on the entrance first.

This picture was another from my backyard. The nuthatch was foraging on a pine tree but also coming to my feeders for sunflower and safflower seed. The lighting isn't great here but I LOVE the composition otherwise with the way he is perched and holding that seed in beak.

 

[Proud2baLaker]

A while back, bookface kept showing me posts from the Carolina Raptor Center in Charlotte, NC. Looked like they did some cool stuff so I followed them. Recently, they posted a plea asking local fishermen for whole, frozen fish under 12" to feed to the eagles and other fish eating raptors they had in rehab or as ambassadors. Well, I just so happen to raise fish for a living out in Idaho (rainbow trout) and one of our products just so happens to be a whole, frozen trout under 10" that we box up primarily to sell to zoos. I checked with some higher ups and then got in touch with the raptor center to see if they would be interested in receiving a few boxes as a donation (about 40 lbs.). They were very excited at the opportunity. So I worked with one of our sales folks and got it all set up. The received the fish last week. Hopefully, I will be getting some cool pictures and/or video soon of eagles just munching down on our fish. Will be sharing them to my company social media for sure.

I have some ok eagle pictures, but not the best. So instead, I will share a different fish eating bird, Ospreys. This pair actually nests at one of our farms on a pole set up by the power company. They don't take fish from the farm, but instead out of a small lake next door. They successfully raised a chick last year and I am waiting for them to return and give it another go. My farm is next door to where this pole is and I did watch one day as one of the Osprey came down and landed within 50 feet of me and took a big pile of that dried moss you see in the photo back to the nest.

 

[aparch]

I think I found my new favorite thread! Thanks for posting these photos!!

 

[Proud2baLaker]

Going to post a bird that is likely familiar to A LOT of folks here, the Common Loon. A migratory bird, the are obviously common during the breeding season in northern Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, and New England but otherwise, the rest of the lower 48 typically only sees them during the migration. I had never actually observed one in Idaho (though I saw them plenty of times in the U.P.). This one was on a small lake that I had spent some time ice fishing on earlier in the winter of 23-24 and came back in the spring to check out what I could find for birds. The first time I came, it was on the far side of the lake and I could not get a good shot. The 2nd time, it was much closer and cooperated to give me a few decent shots. A year or two earlier, one became a little bit of a local celebrity in Boise when it landed on a pond in a downtown park and stayed through the year. The pond was small so the speculation was that it did not have the distance needed to take off. But I believe it did finally leave in the late fall or early winter.

Not to many interesting facts that people probably aren't already aware of. So I will go straight to the picture.