From the Birdfeeder
/Ever since I filled the bird feeder this morning, it has been one busy little restaurant! All day the chickadees and nuthatches have been flitting in and out, grabbing seeds. Initially, they were squeezed out a bit, because a blue jay decided to have his breakfast at the same time. When the big guy comes flying in, it's almost impossible to sneak a seed or two when he isn't looking. The jay would grab a few seeds, and fly over to the pine tree to eat them. Then he would sit, with his little down jacket all puffed up, until it was time to repeat the process.
This afternoon, the feeder was still a flutter of activity. I noticed one of my favorite little birds come swooping in--the white-breasted nuthatch. He is generally outnumbered by his smaller relatives. He has a distinctive flight pattern when he comes in to the feeder, so I can usually recognize him initially by that. I've been trying for a long time to get a photo of him, and today I was finally able to achieve that.
With all of this activity, it makes me wonder about the patterns of the critters in nature. We are due to have a storm in a couple of days, and I am curious if this feeding frenzy is in response to that. I'll have to watch next time something big is predicted, to see if I recognize the same behavior. I know that the birds are noticing the longer days, and perhaps even thinking ahead to spring. They were singing their little hearts out this morning, not quite the spring songs, but still pretty. I, too, am noticing the inclination towards springtime, in the way the sunshine now creeps into my kitchen windows. Perhaps we are past the deepest cold of winter. A sunny, mild day sure can erase the memory of 35 below real fast.
