Winter Bird Photographs

So far this winter has been one for the record books! It looks like we may break the record for recorded snow fall. We have also had record breaking lows and wind chill. My poor birds are having a hard time surviving the cold. In less than twenty-four hours I found three dead birds on my patio.

There were two house sparrows and a male cardinal. It makes me incredibly sad to see this. The temperatures are dropping even lower tonight; I hope I won't find more.

The birds are staying closer to the feeders as the temperatures plummet. This has provided some great backyard bird photography opportunities for me. Here are some of my favorites from today!

I was shooting from my kitchen sliding glass door, which was hazy from the bright sunshine.

The sunshine and the reflection from the snow made it so much easier to capture their dark eyes. It is frustrating trying to photograph them on the dull gray days, which seem to be almost every day during the winter!

 I love using dishes for their food. It makes the pictures a little more interesting than regular bird feeders and they enjoy eating from them, actually preferring them over the tube feeders.

My neighbor's wood fence makes a great backdrop!

 I thought I would have a little photography fun and put out a few stems of fake spring branches. It took a little while, but finally a few of the birds landed on them!

 This is my favorite shot of the day! I used this image tonight for my new business cards. I love my little chickadees! I hope they survive the weather!

I can't wait until spring!

New Teapot Birdhouse

One of my goals as a gardener has been to attract the birds to my small yard. I have one nesting box that that has been used by the black-capped chickadees for several years. Some years they raise two broods. The same box has been used by wrens.



I saw this morning that the black-capped chickadees are already busy building their nest in this box!  The robins are busy building their nest too! That must mean that spring is here for good this time!

I love getting inspiration from Pinterest! (You can follow me if you like!) I had admired some of the teapot birdhouses I had seen and wanted to make one of my own.

The teapot was a Goodwill find and the old drawer was purchased for a dollar or two at a local vendor mall! I thought the drawer would add a little more shelter for the birds.

 

I glued the teapot to the wood and also looped the twine through the opening just in case the teapot should come unglued.  I also glued the top of the teapot to the drawer as a landing perch. 

I need to hang it a little higher, turn it in a different direction, (for better weather protection), and secure it better for less movement. I hope it will have new occupants soon!

I've been felting wool items for projects and saved the loose fibers for the birds. Hopefully I'll have a few more nesting birds here at Robin's Nesting Place!

The Face-Off

The male cardinal and male house sparrow face-off:

The cardinal wins!

No Winter Whining

There is a new meme called, " No Winter Whining- Finding Color in Winter".  It is Jen from Muddy Boot Dreams and  Heather from, Life is a garden.

Winter is in full force today and the temperatures have plummeted! We are under a weather advisory due to wind chills to -20°, but I'm not whining! As the snow fell and the wind blew, I sat for a few hours bird watching! Camera in hand, of course!

It is kind of hard to complain about the weather when I'm safe inside all cozy and warm and especially when I am watching the birds! They just make me happy!

So here is my contribution to Finding Color in Winter!

Hope you enjoy!

Okay, so maybe a little bit of whining, but only because I wanted a caption and could think of nothing clever to say!

You can follow No Winter Whining on Facebook and Pinterest, Jen has the links on her blog post!

He Acts Like He Owns the Place!

 What crazy winter weather we have in Indiana! Saturday was a beautiful sunny day with a high of 63°! What a glorious break for those of us who get a little weary of the grey winter skies!Yesterday the temperatures started dropping and we had torrential rains with flooding. This morning when I went out to fill the bird feeders it was snowing and 16°!

I am still enjoying my mockingbird visitor! Here he/she is eating chunky peanut butter! I thought I would put a few meal worms, seeds and peanuts in a yellow cup to see who my first brave visitor would be. The chickadee was first but too fast to capture and the mockingbird was next. He is beginning to act like he owns the place!

Dove Ghost

Unfortunately another dove hit the sliding glass doors. I didn't see it on the patio so hopefully it wasn't injured.

This also happened in February 2010, and I blogged about it then. Doves have powder down feathers, (extremely fine feathers that disintegrate into a dust-like substance). This powder down  creates a dove ghost when they strike a window!

Observing nature is quite fascinating to me and it causes me to think of the magnificent Creator of these amazing details!

Happy New Year!

 The first few weeks after setting up my winter bird feeding station most of the birds ignored it. All it took was a little snow for  the birds to discover what was tucked in the branches!

The mockingbird was apprehensive at first but is a regular visitor now. It favors the peanut butter cups but also eats the homemade suet.

Happy New Year to each of you

It is so hard to believe that another year has ended. Honestly, I was glad to see that one go! I look forward to 2013 and I am trusting that it will be a better year for my family!

I am going to challenge myself for 2013 and try to post at least one picture a day. It may be an old picture I've taken and never posted, it may just be something I like, it may or may not include text. One thing I won't do is create more stress for myself, so if it becomes too much of a burden or chore I will stop.I need the challenge so that I will get back into the habit of regular blogging and improve my photography. Working has put both on the back burner and I want to change that.

I hope 2013 will be a great year for each of you!

Homemade Suet Recipe

 Once again a few people have asked me for my suet recipe. I posted about my suet in April 2010, so I will just do a quick re-post of that.

I don't use an exact recipe and I don't measure my ingredients. I add different things depending on what I have on hand at the time. Usually when the corn meal, flour, raisins or oats get close to expiring I save them for suet. As long as you use the lard and peanut butter for the base you really can't mess it up.

For this batch I used:

One small tub of lard
2 jars of natural peanut butter that had become hard, (I poured off some of the oil)
corn meal
9 grain bread flour, (you can use any kind of flour)
oatmeal
about 2 tablespoons of sugar
sunflower seeds
raisins
crushed egg shells, ( I save the shells from boiled eggs and put them in the freezer for spring suet)

I melt the lard and peanut butter on the stove on low heat. Once it is blended, I add the dry ingredients mixing and pouring until it is the texture I want. I spread it into a large cookie sheet and let it cool in the refrigerator. Once it has cooled and is firm, I cut it into squares that will fit the suet cages.

Here is the basic recipe that I started with from Julie Zickefoose:


Peanut Butter Suet Dough from Julie Zickefoose

1 cup peanut butter
1 cup lard
Combine and melt these two in the microwave, in the oven, or over very low heat on the stovetop. Remove from heat and stir in:

2 cups plain yellow cornmeal
2 cups quick oats
1 cup flour

Allow to cool and harden, then chop into chunks and store at room temperature in jars. Serve crumbled in a shallow dish.
　
Julie recommends that you only feed the birds this suet during the winter months. I still feed them suet in the spring and include the crushed egg shells for added calcium.

Here is another great resource for suet recipes. As the website shows, you can add all kinds of ingredients to make suet.

Of Blizzards and Birds

Indiana had our first major snow storm of the winter season today. We were under a blizzard warning but most of the major snow and wind was south of me! We only had about four or five inches of snow and thankfully no one in my family had to venture out!

A few weeks ago I wrote about a new winter bird feeding station for a Lowe's Creative Ideas project. Since we had snow in the forecast, I went outside yesterday and replaced some of the food on the tree. It had been warm and rainy and some of the homemade suet had started molding and smelled sour.  I added more suet dipped pine cones and a few lights and ornaments to the tree. I also washed the tiny clay pots and put plain peanut butter in them.

Usually when it snows the birds gather at my feeders in large numbers and I wanted the tree to be ready for them!

It is beautiful flocked with snow!

  I took the pictures through my sliding glass doors that looked like this most of the day! There was also blowing snow that made getting good pictures even more difficult!

 Even though the pictures are not the best quality, I wanted to show the birds that landed on the tree today. It was such a joy to watch them so close to the house!

 The little chickadees are my favorites and they were in and out of the tree all day!

 I was thrilled when they started eating the peanut butter from the clay pots! I was glad that I took the time to wash and refill them on Christmas day!

 The dark-eyed juncos also frequented the tree once they figured out how to maneuver the branches. They are usually ground feeders. 

 I had several mesh bags saved in the pantry and hung a few of them on the tree with home made suet bars in them.

 The chickadees came to the same spot all day and conveniently feasted on suet and peanut butter!

 Here is a female dark-eyed junco eating seeds from the suet dipped pine cone.

 The chickadees also ate seeds from the pine cones.

 Juncos are very difficult to photograph, especially on cloudy days because their eyes are so hard to capture. I don't like bird pictures if I can't clearly see their eyes so these were heavily photoshopped to lighten them enough to see the eyes.

 Same with the little chickadees and their black caps and dark eyes.

 I put a few more lights on the tree yesterday and finally plugged them in. I couldn't wait to see the lights twinkling in the snow and the sweet little birds on the light covered tree.

 I found out this morning that my sweet and cautious husband had unplugged the lights and brought the extension cord inside. He thought it might be hazardous to have lights on in the snow if the high winds blew the tree over. Better safe than sorry, but I was disappointed that I didn't have the lights on in these pictures of the precious chickadee.

The woodpecker landed on the back side of the tree and was also difficult to capture. I'm hoping once he is comfortable landing on the tree that he will venture to the front side!

The robins were in the yard in large numbers devouring the berries from the Bradford and Cleveland pear trees.

A few months ago I read that cardinals eat pumpkin seeds. I love cardinals, especially in the winter and since seed is so expensive I try to save and be frugal however I can! So, rather than throw the pumpkins in the composter, I busted them open and left them on the ground. It isn't very attractive and several times I have looked out the window and regretted that decision. I no longer do! This is a terrible picture, but it is proof that they will eat the seeds! Hopefully more people will save their fall pumpkins for the cardinals during these snowy winter months when their food supply is more scarce! I'm hoping to catch them eating it again when the weather conditions are more favorable.

 I hope everyone is safe today after the severe weather down south yesterday and the winter storms up north today! It has definitely been an eventful two days of crazy weather!

And I wanted to wish you all a belated...

I hope that you were all blessed to be with those you love!

Also a huge thank you to Shirley from Shirls Garden Watch blog for mentioning Robin's Nesting Place on her blog! Shirl and I both have a fondness and fascination for the birds!