Why I Oughta...

In my recently-posted recap/scorecard of what I wanted to do in the yard this past year, I marked the item about getting back into wildlife feeding as a 'miss'.   The reality is that I really ONLY feed the birds and critters during the cold months.  That's something like November to March...usually.   A few years back, the kids and I applied to be a Certified Wildlife Habitat and part of that process is to ensure that your yard is providing - among other things - food.   During COVID, I was home everyday.  And so were kids.  That meant that we had the opportunity to feed the birds and squirrels every morning.  I fed the birds and the kids put cracked corn and various seeds on the perimeter of the fence for the critters to fuel up. I was able to feed the birds everyday because we had this really lovely clear, plastic fly-thru feeder that I bought back in 2018 .  That was a real breakthrough moment for me with birds.  Up until then, I had only used feeders that were closed

The Wintertime is *the* time that we feed the birds around here.  Due to the critters we have around the yard (Raccoons, mice, voles, etc), I mostly lay off adding any feed to the feeders until the first frost arrives.  Once we hit that mark, I then tend to provide fresh food each weekday - both for the critters AND the birds.   Back a few years, we went through the process of becoming a "Certified Wildlife Habitat" via the National Wildlife Federation and part of the criteria is a yard that provides food for wildlife.  They ask for confirmation of a couple of types of feeding including natural nuts (we have Oaks and Walnuts) and seeds (birds, critters) and suet (birds).  We confirmed we go about it both ways - natural via the nuts the trees drop AND the addition of feeders with seed and suet. We put the critter feed - which is a mix of corn, cracked corn, sunflower seeds and some nuts - on the top of the fence.  The KotBTs likes to put it out in three spots.  And, for the b

We had a raptor visitor to our bird feeder this past week and I was able to grab a photo of him/her with their back to us.  You can see it in the photo below that she was perched on the top arm of our feeder set and there wasn't another bird anywhere around.   We've had other birds of prey visitors to our yard over the years and I've posted some photos of them from time-to time.  Last year, I saw a Cooper's Hawk in a similar spot .  And a huge bird far off in the trees .  I heard an owl on my walk to the train in January of 2020 .  And, most recently, a large hawk in October of 2020 .   I've identified the birds in various ways, but I've always been *kinda* sure about the identification.   But, this bird gave me a lot to work with in terms of looks.  Looking through our birding book, I seem to have narrowed it down to two hawks.  A Cooper's Hawk.  Or a Sharp-Shinned Hawk.  According to the book, the Sharp-Shinned Hawk is a 'doppelganger of the Cooper'

For the last ten-plus years, I've been using a couple of stadium cups that I've picked up over the years to fill our bird feeders.  One of them is this one you see below from the Detroit Tigers - featuring Tiger Stadium.  Here's one side showing a sepia tone photo of the old ball park.   Unfortnately, if you look at the bottom of the cup, you'll see why I'm posting these photos.  This one finally cracked and is no longer useful for seed. Here's the back that chronicles the history - starting with the name change to Briggs Stadium in 1961, and renovations in 1979, 1980 and 1993. A key note, is the year on the bottom of the cup.  Although it is blurry, it reads 1999.  See below: What's interesting is that 1999 was the last year for Tiger Stadium.   My sister and Equation Boy/Man were living up in Detroit (or...Birmingham) at the time and we were able to get to a game in the final season.  I have no recollection of who the Tigers played, but I held onto this cu

It is getting back to being the bird feeding time of the year.  I take most of the warm weather months off and feed during the Winter when I don't have to deal (as much) with raccoons and skunks and other large critters.  That means that I'm getting our feeders out of the garage and hanging them up, but it also (this year) meant that I added a new feeder to our program. I found this relatively inexpensive ($4.99 at Home Depot) cage feeder that takes these Peanut Suet Nuggets ($2.96 per bag) that would add a different variety of food to our setup.  Below, you can see the cage feeder - with three perches - and the bag of Peanut Suet Nuggets. I didn't fill the whole feeder, but I think that the bag would fill a little bit MORE than the whole thing, but not that much more.  At $3 per bag, I'm interested in seeing how long this will last and how it performs against the weather; not to mention if it attracts some new visitors.  I normally put out a suet cake (hot pepper) so

This isn't a net new entry to the [ bird visitor log ] here on the blog as I've already documented the Blue Jay in March of 2019 here .  But, I spotted this beauty the other day hanging out by the feeders and he was showing off his blue feathers for a minute or two.  I snapped the photo above (and below) with my phone real quick before he flew off.   Above, he's showing off his full colors on his back.  Below, he's facing the house. I dug around a little bit on the web and learned that Blue Jays are part of the Corvidae family - which is the same family as crows  - that we commonly call "Corvids".

With all the stay-at-home time on our hands, I've begun to work through some of my to-do list in terms of projects.  The first up was a bird feeder.  I've seen Oriole bird feeders at the store, but have never pulled the trigger.  They're expensive and I'm not sure that I've ever seen an oriole in our yard. (Could be...because...um...we don't have an oriole feeder?!?) But, I recently came across these plans for what is billed as an "Easy DIY Oriole Feeder" and I had all the lumber on hand.  (Just a small piece of 2x4, a cedar fence board and a dowel.) What is different about oriole feeders?  They don't use seed.  You have to use specific foods to attract Orioles.  This story on BirdWatchingHQ lays out what you need: use oranges and/or jelly.  And you'll have the best luck during their migration in the Spring.  According to this map , we're in the Baltimore Oriole territory and this Oriole page on JourneyNorth.org lays out when we sho

We had a weird Fall this year - with some warm temperatures then cold temperatures then back to warm.  And then there was the early November snow event that came when many of the trees in our neighborhood still had almost all of their leaves on the limbs.  That caused a bunch of snow damage including taking down a good-sized major limb from one of the big Oak trees in our backyard .  When I say 'good-size', I'm talking about 40+ years old.  Check out the photos in the post to see the growth rings . But that tree damage was just one part of the lasting impact on the yard.  The other you can see in this photo above.  When the snow arrived, I did like I do pretty often:  created a little path out back for Lizzie.  If I don't make her a little path, she doesn't get out in the yard to do her business very easily.  Yes...she's a wimp.  Through and through. And...I also normally cut or shovel a path that gets us to our bird feeder so we can fill it in the mornin

About a month and a half ago, I was complaining about how my big Squirrel Buster bird feeder was leaking seed  - you can see that post here .  Spring is the time when I give our feeders a rest after feeding the birds and critters all Winter long, but for my birthday, I was given this new addition:  a Squirrel Buster Standard Edition.   This is much smaller than the big one we already have and has a little different set-up in terms of how you fill it.  But, it is made by the folks at Brome Bird Care, so I know it is a thoughtful feeder.  I'll get it out on our feeder pole (We have a new one of those, too...so I'll post about it because it is awesome looking) soon and fill it to see what kind of birds we get in late Spring.   

We've had a SquirrelBuster Plus tube feeder for a number of years.  Nat bought it for me for my birthday sometime in the past five or six years.  And for the most part, I have loved the feeder.  With our current setup, I've mostly been using a small mix of seed including thistle seeds in this feeder because we've had larger, seed and nut-based mixes in our fly-through feeder .  The song birds seem to hanging out at the fly-through mostly.  The peckers and nut thatches spend their time on the suet cages.  And the little finches and sparrows and others seem to be using the tube feeder.    Here's a post from here on the blog showing an American Goldfinch perched on the feeder outside our kitchen windows.  It was working just fine back then.  But recently, I've noticed that the SquirrelBuster is emptying really rapidly.  In about a day.  And I'm assuming that a squirrel is getting to it and shaking.  For most of its life, this feeder served it's name:  it bu

Look who I spotted on our fence?!?  A bird of prey.  See him perched on the top edge?  In the photo above, you can see how close he is to the fly-thru feeder that we see a lot of song birds eating at most mornings.  I'm pretty sure he's a Cooper's Hawk.  But, I'm not too adept at identification of hawks and my phone's zoom only does so much in terms of quality photos.  I was too excited to spot him and wanted to be sure I got a couple of photos of him, so I never got around to grabbing the binoculars and peeping at him closely.   For those keeping track at home, this is the second time I've posted about this kind of bird of prey visiting.  The first time was back in 2012 when I posted about a hawk coming into Nat's parent's backyard in Naperville.  Photo here .  Turns out, identifying this particular hawk is not the easiest as according to the folks at FeederWatch , even more advanced bird identification experts get Cooper's Hawk confus

The last time I added an entry to the [backyard bird visitor log] was back in April when I documented the American Goldfinch.  Today, I'm adding the Northern Flicker to the list.  You'll have to trust me because I didn't have my phone on me when I was watching the feeders, but due to the yellow feathers and the huge size of this bird, I'm confirming a Northern Flicker.  I recognize that this isn't quite how it supposed to work but ever since Nat gave me a pair of binoculars as a gift last year, my bird viewing has improved, but my camera skills have remained flat.  So, I'm seeing *more*, but not necessarily photographing *more*. This is the second woodpecker that we've added to the visitor log - the first of which was the Red-Bellied Woodpecker . Full [ bird feeder visitor log ] set of seven entries here on the blog: This Northern Flicker. Not in our backyard, but up in Wisconsin - this pair of Scarlet Tanagers A series of American Goldfinches A

We have had a few new visitors to our feeders recently and they're all colored gold.  Or yellow.  They're American Goldfinches and you can see one of them in the photo above.  We have both - what I think are - males and females.  Males with a much more striking gold and the females with their winter plumage.  I snapped the photo above out of kitchen windows one morning recently.  And we knew what it was immediately.  But we went to the Field Guide anyway.  Here's the listing for the American Goldfinch below: The one you see above is at our squirrel-proof feeder that I've filled with thistle seed.  Let's call this one the fifth species that we've documented as part of our [ backyard bird visitor's log ] here on the blog. The other four from this Winter/Spring: Red-bellied woodpecker House Sparrow Male and Female Cardinals White-breasted Nuthatch

I'm giving the whole bell-shaped bird seed thing a go.  Back in early January, I posted about a "Christmas Bell" that the kids gave me for Christmas that featured fruit and nuts and billed itself as 'no melt', so there was some suet involved, I'd think.  As quickly as I put that seed bell up on on post, it was gone.  Taken by some critter.  Maybe a squirrel, but more likely...a racoon.   At least, that's where my brain is right now having seen a couple of big fatty raccoons in our yard on a couple of occasions lately.  Having come across a seed bell from Kaytee (that you can see below) on sale at Menards, coupled with the fact that I had previously bought the 'seed bell hanger', so I was willing to get right back on the saddle with another one of these. This time, however, I am prepared.  The old one was put up on a pole that had a baffle on 'top' of the bell.  Meaning...I was attempting to keep critters from kind of 'jumping

Since the beginning of this year, I've started to chronicle here on the blog some of our backyard bird visitors .  First, there was the red-bellied woodpecker .   Then, the House Sparrow .  And most recently, I snapped photos of both a male and female Cardinal .     Today, here's a few photos of a new visitor:  the White-breasted Nuthatch.  I found him hopping around the ground under one of our feeders on a recent morning.  He's very pretty with blues, blacks, greys and whites all over and a striking black streak across the top of his head.     As a reminder, I take these photos quickly, through screens in the windows on my phone zoomed all the way in.  So they're not great.  But, they're here to diary (for me) some of the visitors.  Here, below, is a different look at the same bird: As soon as I saw this guy, I, of course, grabbed my Field Guide to Illinois Birds and tried to figure out what he was.  After thumbing through a few pages, I came

As you guys know by now, we've become bird people .  We're now running four different feeders, a birdbath and even installed a water wiggler to attract the birds with moving water .  And while we have plans to install even more landscaping , trees and (gasp!) even a water feature , we have quite a bit of existing trees , shrubs and brush in our #newoldbackyard. We're pretty lucky to live on a mature and wooded lot with close proximity to a big pond ( Barth Pond ) and a creek that runs north from the pond behind some of our neighbor's houses.  That water source is a big factor in our neighborhood being able to attract and support wildlife.  Some of it is great!  Like birds and owls and hawks and rabbits and even foxes.  Some not so great?  Skunks and coyotes are also around.  Little Lizzie was skunked last fall and I'm sure it won't be the last time. Now listen...we're not camping people.  Or at least I'm not a camping person.  But, I do love cr

Two weeks ago, I posted about the new fly-through bird feeder that we added to our backyard birding setup and mentioned how we had not yet witnessed it being used (but...knew it was due to the bird poop on the squirrel baffle).   I've posted two visitors to our feeders here in the [ bird visitor log ] tag but they were on different feeders.  First was a red-bellied woodpecker on our suet feeder .  Then just last week, I posted a photo of a house sparrow on one of our hanging gravity feeders.  When we put up the fly-through feeder, I was hoping for Cardinals.  Guess what?  We had a few visitors!  While these photos aren't awesome because they're with my phone all zoomed in and through Winter windows with screens, I'm hoping you can make out what is happening. First...this beautiful red male cardinal.  If you look closely, you'll see he's on there with a House Sparrow chowing down. And like two minutes later, he took off and stood guard.  So his lady co

Back a few weeks ago, I posted a photo of a Red-Bellied Woodpecker that had visited us on our suet feeder as the first documented bird since I was gifted the Field Guide to Birds of Illinois by Nat and the kids for Christmas.  When I posted that, I also created a new tag here on the blog [ Bird Visitor Log ].  That's now a *thing* here on the blog.  And this, becomes the second entry. I snapped that photo above through the kitchen windows (and screens) of what I'm pretty sure is a House Sparrow perched on our feeder.  According to the Field Guide (which you can see below), this is the #1 bird to get to your feeders.  So, that fact coupled with the feathers/patterns/colors make think that we're checking the "House Sparrow" box. From the entry in the book:  "When you put up a new bird feeder, there's a very good chance that the first bird to attend with be a House Sparrow." Turns out, it was introduced to North America from Europe in the

 Over the weekend, I came across this clear plastic round fly-thru platform feeder at where else?  Menards of course..  It comes with a wide, deep platform for seed and a broad, clear plastic dome cover that shelters the seeds and what-have-you from the weather.  I paired it with a Stokes Select Bird Feeder Pole and a Northstates two-way squirrel baffle .  The feeder was a discontinued item and had no packaging on it, so it was a screamin' deal.   It was the last one and marked way down, so I, of course, glommed on to it. I've been thinking of adding a fly-thru feeder to our mix back there.  What's a fly-thru (or fly-through) bird feeder?  Well...they're exactly what you think:  a platform of some type with a roof over it.  That allows birds to fly through and land on the platform.  Instead of perching on the side/edge of a feeder, this one encourages a different behavior and (hopefully) different type of bird. The advantages of a fly-thru feeder, according to

Just a few days ago, I posted a photo of the Illinois Bird Field Guide that Nat gave me for Christmas and today I can share that is already paying dividends!  We had a visitor to our suet feeder that I was able to get that grainy photo you can see above.  There's a screen up in that window and I didn't want to get too close for fear of scaring him away, so you're going to have to deal with the Zapruder film-version of my woodpecker.   But..that's him up there.  I've posted about woodpeckers before here on the blog last summer when I showed our tailprop suet feeder back in Elmhurst here .  But for the first time, we're able to identify our visitor - which is very exciting!  (at least to me...) I snapped that photo before the bird flew off and then scurried over to my office to open up the field guide to figure out who it was.  As you can see in the photo above, he has a red head, right?  Welp...that would be a big tell!  He's NOT a red-headed