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Tag: backyard wildlife

The wildlife that visits my backyard in Austin, TX.

Black-Crested Titmouse

March 22, 2007 • • 4 Comments

This guy has been coming round here in the mornings to beat the wrens to the mealworms. Early bird and all that.

He’s a black-crested titmouse, similar to the tufted titmouse, but found only in Oklahoma, Texas and Mexico. Apparently they used to be considered a separate race from the regular tufted titmice, not a separate species, but now they’re a separate species. The species also apparently hybridize where their ranges overlap, such as here in central Texas.

I finally saw him while I had happened to have my camera handy, but the focus is a bit off. Part of that is the distortion of shooting through the window. Part of that is the focus being off.

I’m enjoying trying to ID and photograph the birds that come through here. It’s a fun little hobby combining photography, research and blogging. Plus I can do it from home, which is nice when you don’t really feel like doing much after work.

Visit Transitions for a nice shot of a regular tufted titmouse.

Also, I and the Bird #45 is up at Journey Through Grace. Check it out.

Update: This post has been edited. I originally ID’d this bird as a tufted “black-crested” titmouse, but my bird book is seemingly out of date since the black-crested are now a separate genetically distinct species. Thanks to Mike at 10,000 Birds who called my attention to this in the comments. More can be found about these birds at The Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s All About Birds site or Wikipedia. When I mentioned this to the actual bird, though, he told me just to call him Roger.

Chipping Sparrows

March 20, 2007 • • 2 Comments

I see these little guys all the time, crowding around the spilled seed beneath the feeder. I have a tendency to name any small brown bird a sparrow so I was pleasantly surprised to learn that these guys really are sparrows, chipping sparrows to be precise.

According to my bird book, chipping sparrows are nicknamed “hairbirds” because they use hair in their nests that they steal from unsuspecting horses and sometimes napping dogs. Perhaps – gasp! – even lazy greyhounds.

Apparently, they are also one of the signs of spring in northern climes where they replace the American tree sparrows that move up to the Arctic to breed.

Blue Jay

March 19, 2007 • • 7 Comments

Blue Jays are one of my favorite backyard birds. Whenever they come around, I find myself stopping to watch and see what they do.

This one had things to say. He hopped around in the tree and then down to the fence, chirping and squawking at me. I know they can be fairly aggressive birds, and since this is a family blog, I won’t repeat exactly what he was squawking.

Perhaps he felt the feeder needed a refill.

Either way, it’s nice to have colorful birds come by from time to time.

Backyard Wildlife

March 16, 2007 • • Leave a comment

I spent the early part of the week working in the yard trying to create something of a bird world. I love watching birds, and lately I’ve been wanting to increase the variety that come around as well as learn who they are.

We’ve had a bird feeder up for the past two years. I fill it up. Mr. Squirrel comes along and empties it onto the ground, and then he and the white-winged doves eat most of the seeds; therefore, the first step was to give Mr Squirrel his own feeder.

He seems to like it.

In addition to the (still vacant) owl house I hung, I put up a wren house. Two Carolina wrens moved in and built a nest of sticks and feathers, and as of yesterday, there were two eggs in the nest.

I also hung up a suet feeder to try to get woodpeckers and finches, and a bluebird nest box (that will probably house more wrens since I’ve never seen a bluebird around here) went up as well.

Here’s the birds I know I’ve seen so far in the past few weeks.

I love springtime.

The Wolery

January 22, 2007 • • 10 Comments

Last weekend, we visited Wild Birds Unlimited to see about getting a better home for the guy out front. We got a hanging birdhouse, but on the way out we noticed some pictures of owls looking out of boxes.

“Whoa!” I exclaimed. “You can get owl houses?!?”

The store manager nodded and pointed to the owl nest boxes above the counter. I learned that the eastern screech owl lives in these parts, and that they eat mostly bugs, spiders and small mice. My wife and I looked at the picture and quickly decided that a home isn’t a home without some owls.

Getting it mounted in the tree was a bit of a challenge requiring a ladder and some contortions, but it’s there now. Hopefully some homeless owl will stumble on it. If not, I’m sure the squirrels will enjoy it.

While searching for screech owl info, I came upon Chris’ Eastern Screech Owl Nest Box Cam, a site dedicated to the goings on in a nest box here in Austin that’s been tricked out with cameras and other gadgetry.

Mine’s just a box, so hopefully a few Austin owls won’t mind living in something so archaic.

Incidentally, the title of this post refers to Owl’s house in The House at Pooh Corner. Owl, you’ll remember, spells his name W-O-L, but has a great deal of trouble with more difficult words like measles and buttered toast.