Any songbird lovers?

[The Second]

I have about a half acre back yard and several resident songbirds who inhabit it. By far the most interesting is the owl, probably a great horned owl judging by his call. I've never actually caught sightsight of him, but I think he hangs out in one of the big pecan trees about an hour or so after dark. He starts talking and keeps going for hours... I think he may be unhappy with/infatuated with the owl decoy standing in my garden to keep crows out of my vegetables.

Then there're the mockingbirds who live in the mulberry tree about a hundred yards or so from the house. They keep to themselve mostly, unless my dog gets a little too close to close their territory. Then they start chattering and, if Daisy is a little too slow to take the hint, dive bombing. Its pretty funny seeing a full grown pit bull running full tilt from a pair of little birds.

The other residents are a pair of killdeer that that hang out in the big open area between the house and the highway. I'm pretty sure their the same couple who've lived here for about three or four years now.

It should be noted, I guess, that I don't feed the birds, they just decided that my place looked like good digs.

Anyone else have interesting feathered residents?

[Crow]

(cough) Technically a song bird (cough) :smallcool:

[The Second]

(cough) Technically a song bird (cough) :smallcool:

While I do think crows are pretty special because of their intelligence, I think of them more as loudmouthed thugs that enjoy pecking apart my beans, peas, and tomatoes.

[Crow]

While I do think crows are pretty special because of their intelligence, I think of them more as loudmouthed thugs that enjoy pecking apart my beans, peas, and tomatoes.

The more (https://corvidresearch.wordpress.com/2014/06/20/do-crows-reduce-other-songbirds/) you know (https://www.britannica.com/animal/Corvidae). :smallwink:

[The Second]

The more (https://corvidresearch.wordpress.com/2014/06/20/do-crows-reduce-other-songbirds/) you know (https://www.britannica.com/animal/Corvidae). :smallwink:

Did you know that crows can count? They also craft simple tools to fish insects out of holes. They are also notorious nest robbers, stealing and feeding on chicks while their parents are otherwise occupied. And of course crows are smart enough to know am easy meal when they see one, and will happily raid a garden for all its worth.

I like crows... when their at the city park, hopping around and being all cool and stuff. But when its kind of frustrating to come home and see half a dozen crows fly off after gobbling up my tasty beans.

http://www.techtimes.com/articles/59279/20150610/brain-activity-reveals-crows-count.htm

http://www.onekind.org/education/animal_sentience/tool_use/tool_use_in_new_caledonia_crows/

http://crows.net/food.html

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/American_Crow/lifehistory

[Crow]

Did you know that crows can count? They also craft simple tools to fish insects out of holes. They are also notorious nest robbers, stealing and feeding on chicks while their parents are otherwise occupied. And of course crows are smart enough to know am easy meal when they see one, and will happily raid a garden for all its worth.

I like crows... when their at the city park, hopping around and being all cool and stuff. But when its kind of frustrating to come home and see half a dozen crows fly off after gobbling up my tasty beans.

http://www.techtimes.com/articles/59279/20150610/brain-activity-reveals-crows-count.htm

http://www.onekind.org/education/animal_sentience/tool_use/tool_use_in_new_caledonia_crows/

http://crows.net/food.html

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/American_Crow/lifehistory

I did, as a matter of fact! I was just pointing out that they are technically songbirds.

[The Second]

I did, as a matter of fact! I was just pointing out that they are technically songbirds.

Of the glam punk variety, yes. Definitely the Alice Cooper of the songbirds.

Anyway, I'm willing to shake over a mutual love of feathered friends.

[Rockphed]

I prefer mine warm in a gooseberry sauce. :smalltongue:

My parents have a large back-yard. For most of my formative years, they put out bird-feeders. Mostly we fed sparrows and squirrels, but there were also gold- and house-finches, the occasional woodpecker, cardinals, mourning doves, blue-jays (or maybe blue-birds), grackels, starlings(ugh, dang invasive species!), and hummingbirds.

Also, one time a hawk of some sort decided to land on our fence. That was pretty cool.

[veti]

When I was a kid, I lived in English countryside, and I remember waking up early enough, occasionally, to hear the dawn chorus. It was incredibly loud. Sounded like a thousand different birds competing to be heard just outside my window.

I haven't heard anything like it recently. Of course that's to be expected, since I no longer live there - and on my rare visits, I don't generally wake up early enough. But I also fear that that dawn chorus may have gone for good. My homeland's bird population has tilted, in recent decades, sharply away from the best songbirds - thrushes, finches - in favour of monotonic crows and pigeons. And, while I have nothing against those birds in their place, I think "their place" should be just one niche among many. I don't particularly want to listen to a whole battery of the things, ever.

New Zealand has a rich selection of birds that were introduced specifically to make British ex-pats, like me, feel at home - including thrushes, finches, sparrows, and my favourite songbird, the skylark. The population of skylarks in my native land has dropped by more than 90% since my childhood; but mercifully, they seem to be surviving well enough here in New Zealand. However, the avian soundscape here is very different. It's about tuis and riflemans and silvereyes, none of which seem to use sustained, continuous song in the same way as the introduced species do.

[tantric]

here's a story i wrote about mockingbirds, y'all might like it


when the realpeople first came into the new world, they all lived in one place. the wisest among them knew that this was no good, that they would exhaust the land if they all stayed together. but what to do? every night the realpeople built campfires out on the plains, and it was like the stars had fallen to earth, go great were their numbers. the elders came together to discuss this and one ventured, if only we spoke different languages then perhaps we would scatter, and when we came back together, we could exchange foods. another responded, well, we do know brother mockingbird, who knows all of the languages of the birds, perhaps he could help us. so they conferred more and set about making the prayer offering to bring brother mockingbird, who lit on a prickly pear the next morning, saying, yo man, ssup? the elders explained. brother mockingbird told them, yeah, i got dis for ya. how about you, chief, you wanna twist your tongue, too? the elders respectfully declined, keeping the original language. that night, mockingbird flitted from one burnt out camp fire to the next. at each he would take something from his buckskin pouch, holding as if it were full of bees trying to escape, and bury that thing in the ashes, then take something else from the firepit and put that instead into the strange pouch. thus he went from fire to fire until it was all done, then he returned to the chief and gave him the bustling pouch and said, yo, now this **** is on y’all. take that bag out and bury it, burn it and bury it again. thus the elders did, while brother mockingbird sat on his cactus and kibbutzed. then as the sun rose, and the realpeople with it, the found that for each camp fire, those closest to it had a new language that they did not share with any of the other realpeople. they were dismayed, of course, this was a terrible shock – families unable to talk to each other. then brother mockingbird spoke to them all, in every language and none, and said, i have gifted you as your elders requested, but i have also give you my gift, unknown to them. now the realpeople, like me, can learn any language with time and care. SNAP, bitches, ’cause i roll like dat! and he flew away.

so now, rainbow children, when you see a mockingbird, you must tell him, “gracias, arigatoo, xie-xie and shikamoo” to thank him for the gifts of language he gave us.

[Kalmageddon]

This summer I spent a probably excessive amount of time rescuing blackbird chicks that fell from the nest on the island I work on. Luckly I never got caught, or my reputation as a cold blooded and robotic security officer might have been tarnished.

[Crow]

This summer I spent a probably excessive amount of time rescuing blackbird chicks that fell from the nest on the island I work on. Luckly I never got caught, or my reputation as a cold blooded and robotic security officer might have been tarnished.

Good man!!!

[Grand Arbiter]

As far as birds go, I am familiar with quite a few from around my home town. Not all are songbirds, but here goes:

•Robins are fairly common. I've seen them all over.
•Ducks can be a pleasant surprise. It's fun to watch them go bottoms-up if nothing else.
•Pigeons can be fun to feed bread/etc. to.
I had a class trip to Italy earlier this year; Venice, Florence and Rome were our stops. Something special for the students of my high school who have learned the language.

The pigeons in Venice, Piazza San Marco in particular, were the boldest ones I've ever seen. I had to almost step on them for them to move their feathered butts out of my way. :smallannoyed:

Someone in my group also happened to receive a "present" from said pigeons.:smallyuk: Fortunately, I had Clorox wipes.•Canadian geese & seagulls. The two most common birds on my college campus. :smallyuk:
•Red-tailed hawks are one of the more common birds of prey. Usually you can tell that one is around either by hearing it or if the small birds all hide.
•Turkey vultures. Meh.
•Assorted finches, sparrows, and chickadees. I believe house finches and black-capped chickadees were the most prevalent of their groups.
•Gackles (phonetic spelling). Small little black birds with yellow/gold flecks on their wings. They re usually seen picking through someone's lawn for a meal.
•Mourning Doves. A far more pleasant alternative to the standard pigeons.
•Catbird. A small gray bird with a patch of black on its head. It commonly sounds either like a creaky door, or as if it's saying the name "Erik".
•Cardinals. Males are bright red, females a dull brown. The former are seen more often than the latter for obvious reasons.
•Bluejays. Loud birds, fond of nuts (peanuts in particular). I have yet to see it in person, but my grandmother says they'll dive bomb squirrels and this cat that sneaks into her yard. (She has several bird feeders.)
•Crows. My town has a lot of them. They serve as a cleaning crew, and I'd be willing to bet that they set up some sort of relay system when they fly out in the morning.This summer, my dad told me about a study/research he read about. The researchers would send people into a room full of crows. Each person would either be carrying a dead bird (non crow) or a deceased crow. (There may have been a third group that had stuffed or taxidermied crows, or that could have been the second group. My memory stinks.) The crows would harangue the individuals with dead/stuffed/whatever crows, but not the others. That may have been expected, but the real kicker is that they remembered the people with crows and harangued them again when they returned later sans-bird.

I think thereby have also been something that found out crows will try to ascertain cause of death when they find a deceased crow.

[Vinyadan]

Some news about bird vocalization from the past:
http://nyti.ms/2dYh9cp


Did you know that crows can count?

Ever heard of Counting Crows? :smallbiggrin:

[Artemis97]

We have a number of different bird species in our area. I've seen cardinals, male and female, and robins by the hundreds when they swarm. (I think they're robins, anyways, they have the red/orange breast. Might be orioles?) There's a group of doves that hang around on our street and pick through the grass in the mornings. Used to startle them on my way to school. Not deliberately, just by walking past.

The most common songbird is the mockingbird, by far. There's one that likes to perch on our house and yell at us. Mom's named him wise...butt. (well, a ruder term for butt, you can guess) He liked to steal the young orange buds off our little orange tree and dad used to feed him cheerios. We also had one that lived near my bus stop, funniest thing, too. He'd picked up the 'song' of a car alarm and would sound it every morning.

We also have blue jays, and scrub jays, though those are rare. Used to see the scrub jays on the golf course before they developed it. There's a preserve for them by one of the elementary schools, but I don't know how much habitat it provides, as they seem to like to stick to the brush around open areas near houses.

There's also ibises, which go around in big groups. They're very skittish, though I did manage to tempt some near me with french fries once. Got them to eat out of my hand.

The biggest birds we have around are Sandhill Cranes. They're not song birds by any stretch of the imagination. In fact they sound a little like velociraptors. They're noticeable, though, as they walk around in groups, and they're as tall as a man. They like to stop traffic as they take their time crossing the roads.

Lastly there's a hawk that hangs around on the telephone wires in our back yard. I think he's a red-tailed hawk. Maybe a red shoulder. He's very brown. Oh! And we do get bald eagles occasionally. One dropped a fish in front of dad and I in a McDonald's parking lot when he was harassed by some crows. Osprey are common too. They like to nest in the big dead trees that dot the forests around here, especially near the water. Easy to spot in flight because of their distinctive M wing shape.