- Joined
- Mar 31, 2011
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- 11,748
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- Location
- Atherton Tablelands
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- snailseyeview.medium.com
mrsmig, I was thinking about doing a Better-Than-Usual (rather than a Big) Year in 2016, because I just don't notice enough.
mrsmig, I was thinking about doing a Better-Than-Usual (rather than a Big) Year in 2016, because I just don't notice enough.
Be honest - you were just going to hang around AW and check off a bird for each time you saw your own avatar pic, right?
mrsmig, I was thinking about doing a Better-Than-Usual (rather than a Big) Year in 2016, because I just don't notice enough.
I put out feed in the winter and enjoy the antics, but I don't really keep track of different species (I tried, once, but got boggled by all the little sparrow-like guys - oh, that's a subspecies of sparrow, but that's a female goldfinch, and that's a... I don't know. They're just cute little birds who like seeds.)
<<snip>>
ETA: I have no idea how to tell how big an image is (other than just looking at it?) and no idea how to resize it anyway, so - if this one is too big, let me know and I'll delete.
I had a life list, once. It was all in my Peterson's. Left it on a fence post somewhere.
(May I say with a modest touch of pride that I took the picture that is my avatar? Yeah, it's not a bird. I was bird-watching when I found him!)
If you haven't seen the study done here by a couple of profs from the University of Washington about crows learning faces, here's a capsule of it: http://www.nwf.org/news-and-magazin...ds/archives/2013/crows-recognizing-faces.aspx
We have western tanagers here but only as migrators. They are shy, stay mainly in the shelter belts because of the pine trees but they are so wildly colored you can't miss them. My grandmother's dining room had scarlet tanager wallpaper. It was the first bird after robins and blue jays that I could identify. I have only seen maybe eight in my lifetime. Envy anyone who sees them regularly. --s6
I'm pretty sure I saw a summer tanager in Richmond, VA in June. I've seen scarlet tanagers occasionally here in Indiana, but had never seen a summer one before--I was able to look at it long enough to be sure it didn't have black wings, but was completely red. Just beautiful. Sadly, no camera--we were out running.Ages ago, I was in DC and I think I saw a summer tanager. (I can't be sure - it was red, about tanager sized, and it flew across the path in front of me too fast for a real ID.)
I put out feed in the winter and enjoy the antics, but I don't really keep track of different species (I tried, once, but got boggled by all the little sparrow-like guys - oh, that's a subspecies of sparrow, but that's a female goldfinch, and that's a... I don't know. They're just cute little birds who like seeds.)
The only species I really keep close track of is the wild turkeys, because they're pretty hard to miss. I live on top of a nearly-a-cliff hill, and in the winter the turkeys will fly in to the grassland at the bottom of the hill, then send a sentry up to scout out the yards (my neighbour also feeds birds) and if the coast is clear, the whole flock will come up, one at a time. We call it the March of the Turkeys.
Everyone says they're a really hard bird to hunt, but... I'm really not sure why...
ETA: I have no idea how to tell how big an image is (other than just looking at it?) and no idea how to resize it anyway, so - if this one is too big, let me know and I'll delete.