#Red-bellied Grackle

[toyastales]

Red-Bellied Grackle

[butcherlarry]

Exercise Fic Recs 18

I am honestly surprised how much I have been reading.  Holy Moly.  

look how sweet life has become by susiecarter  (Superbat, WIP (but will probably be finished tonight).  A six plus one fic for Clark Kent week.  Slice of life and very sweet 💗)

The Power of Family and This Stalker I Found by JackHawksmoor  (Batfam, WIP.  An AU were Bruce found Jason after he was resurrected, and Tim joins the family.  Also, Tim knows about them being vigilantes, but the fam doesn’t know that he knows, so shenanigans ensue.) 

Everything Will Be Just Fine by lonelynpc  (Batfam, WIP.  More goth dad Battinson)

always an angel never a god by Arwriter  (Batfam, complete.  Trigger warning for suicide attempt.  Jason gets hurt, and Bruce talks to him about his concerns.  Much hurt/comfort ensue.)

Unbelievable by BoredomBeckons  (Superbat?  Kinda?  They are at least good friends :)  Complete.  Bruce’s persona is a bit too good.  Clark thinks Batman is joking when he tells him his secret identity.  Shenanigans ensue.)

WE’LL SWIM WITH THE CURRENT. by orpheusaki  (Batfam, complete.  Mermaid AU.  Bruce carries baby mermaid Jason.  It’s super adorable.)

Giant of the Waves by supermanstoddlerleash  (Superbat, complete.  Mermaid AU.  Bruce goes to visit his boyfriend, who happens to be a giant fuck off mermaid shark 💖)

Action and Re-Action by Mithen  (Superbat, Complete.  A retelling of Bruce meeting Clark.)

Dynasty of frauds by msOdds  (Superbat, WIP.  Omegaverse Injustice AU.  Palace drama!!!!  In Kandor!!!!)

the color violet by TheResurrectionist  (Batfam, complete.  Slice of life.  From the point of view of a EMT.  Newly warded (is that a word?  it is now) Dick gets hurt, and New Dad Bruce deals with it.)

I was in a candy mood, so I got the snickers latte with my croissant.

There is a pond next to were I work, and it is common for us employees to take a walk around it during lunch.  I always see so many cool birds, and I’ve been itching to bring my nice camera there to get some good pictures.  The only time I’ve willingly come to work on the weekend, and it’s for some birds, lol.

I FINALLY GOT A GOOD PICTURE OF A BLUE HERON!!!

Also look at this little guy!  A robin!  And he caught himself some breakfast!!

The whole geese family!!

BABIES

MORE BABIES

I’VE BEEN DETECTED

Grackle!

Green Heron!  I’ve only ever seen the big blue guy, so it was excited to see this little green guy!

I was so excited when I got this picture, because I only see them when they’re flying!  It’s a barn swallow!  For a while, I couldn’t figure out what kind of swallow where flying around the ponds.  I thought they were probably barn swallows because of the red bellies and necks, so I’m super happy I got this picture to confirm my suspicions! 

I also saw some new birds at the arboretum, along with the usual suspects :)

A male and female wood duck:

I had no idea what this guy was until I got home to examine the pictures, but it’s a yellow-billed cuckoo!

A red-bellied woodpecker:

I crossed paths with another birder when I was walking, and he let me know that there was an owl in the area I was coming up to!  I was so happy I was able to spot him.  A barred owl:

I have been trying to get a picture of this little guy for a while.  An Acadian flycatcher:

PHOTOGRAPHER SPOTTED.  AGAIN.

Tree swallow!

a cute little white-breasted nuthatch!

A BEEEEEEEE:

I just really like this view:

Pretty flowers!

Lily pads!

More flowers!

I also have tomorrow off because of the holidays, so don’t be surprised if you see another post from me with more birds!

[ceruleanvulpine]

huge respect to @myxinidaes for reblogging that post with 100 birds

[balconybirds]

Sunday Birding

I wasn’t able to do as much birding today because I broke my toe, so I wanted to take it a bit easy on my walk.  I was still able to go around the pond at work, but I just went to the bird watch station at the arboretum instead of doing my usual wander around the place.  I might go again tomorrow since I have the day off (I gave myself a four day weekend with the holiday :D).  Anyway, on to the birds! 

Pretty sure this is a brown thrasher, fluffing themselves up in a tree:

There were a bunch of these guys running around.  They look like female red-winged black birds, but I also think some of them are juveniles too:

My buddy!!  The grackle!!  I love watching them hop around:

Some wildflowers around the pond:

The baby Canadian geese...they grow up so fast...

They were on guard duty:

Looking at a sus human...

Is that good for your neck bud?

BEEEEEEEEEEE:

I don’t know what this guy is but they’re SO FUCKING COOL:

This goldfinch is dealing with some technical difficulties:

I love this female cardinal’s tuft!  So cute!

Male cardinal detected:

This female house finch is trying to blend in with her surroundings:

A female red-bellied woodpecker grabbing a snack:

A white-breasted nuthatch:

NOOOO, THEY DROPPED THEIR TREAT!! 

A male downy woodpecker:

A tufted titmouse:

Some pretty flowers:

[sunshinesight]

Please vote for my entry in the Spoonflower 2024 Calendar Wall Hangings Design Challenge: https://www.spoonflower.com/design-challenge/2024-calendar-wall-hangings-2023-10/vote

Voting is open until 3pm on 3 October 2023.

my entry: 2024 backyard birds You don’t need an account to vote, but it requires a captcha.

[headspace-hotel]

I am being driven to madness by the fact that bees and butterflies aren't better studied than other pollinators because they are more important to the ecosystem, they are just better studied because...people like them more?

Seriously

My plants are attracting HUGE amounts of flies, ants, wasps, and moths, and when I identify them and look them up there is no information! Especially flies, wow. They're so diverse, there's SO many different kinds. I'm getting a ton of bee-mimic flies and hover flies.

Wikipedia says hover fly larvae eat aphids while the adults are pollinators. That means they are beneficial in two ways at once! But most of the Wikipedia pages for species are only one sentence, if they exist at all. Likewise here's the wiki page for the most common bee mimic fly where I am. It's one sentence!

If you only pay attention to butterflies and bees, and plant the plants that are the best for butterflies and bees, you would maybe neglect keystone plants that support the largest amount of other insects. And these insects are like, a massive proportion of the bugs in a healthy ecosystem. And birds and mammals need bugs for food! A lot of birds are mostly insectivorous, and anyways, an unbalanced diet of all bird seed can't be healthy even for the omnivorous birds. They need to eat a variety of foods!

Not to mention that larvae are necessary for feeding baby birds!

The back yard is overflowing with birds. There are red-bellied woodpeckers, a gray catbird, a barn swallow, tree swallows, wrens, sparrows, house finches, goldfinches, bluebirds, bluejays, grackles, orioles, cardinals, doves, and a bunch of others I'm forgetting about, and they are constantly singing and making a commotion, and it's louder now than the ugly man-made sounds that are always barging in through the quiet.

[herpsandbirds]

Red-bellied Grackle (Hypopyrrhus pyrohypogaster), family Icteridae, order Passeriformes, endemic to Colombia

photograph by Félix Uribe 

[magnetothemagnificent]

I am on Spring break so I finally get to focus on birding again! Today's birds:

Little blue heron

Black vulture

Great egret

Sandhill crane

Mourning dove

Cattle egret

Great blue heron

Anhinga

Double crested cormorant

Red winged Blackbird

Limpkin

Wood stork

White ibis

Muskovy duck

Boat-tailed grackle

American crow

American coot

Common gallinule

Common grackle

Glossy ibis

Palm warbler

Common grackle

Osprey

American purple gallinule

Wood duck

Red shouldered hawk

Pied billed grebe

Royal tern

Eastern Phoebe

Roseate spoonbill

Black-bellied Whistling duck

Tricolor heron

Northern harrier

Yellow rumped warbler

Tree swallow

Swallow tailed kite

Ring billed gull

Turkey vulture

Little blue heron

Mallard

White pelican

Red eyed vireo

Mulard

Pekin x Mallard Hybrid (there was this fascinating flock of ducks consisting of mallards, feral pekins, muskovy ducks, mulards (muskovy x mallard hybrid), and Pekin/mallard hybrids)

Feral American pekin

[ovaruling]

no one asked, but here’s my detailed bird seed update since this blog has become not only a record keeper of my fitness but also my bird friends:

adjusting my budget severely for the elaborate bird feeding i’ve got going on. to recap, i feed about 200+ wild birds per day, mostly doves, grackles, blue jays, cardinals, catbirds, warblers, mockingbirds, and woodpeckers. sometimes i get a rare painted bunting! the number may possibly be more, my counting when they swarm is not reliable.

when i first started feeding, the birds were all terribly thin—the development in my neighborhood has been devastating to the general health of the bird population, as well as the sweltering heat of recent years. growing up, i remember it being a common sight to see birds milling about on the ground, scavenging for food. you almost never see it anymore, bc there IS no more ground. if its not paved, then it’s all tightly mowed grass with no chance for food to even have a chance to be there. based on the cityscape, my guess is that they have had to fly further and further distances in search of somewhere to forage. which, in this climate, must be utterly sapping them. they haven’t moved away, they still nest right here bc there are still thankfully lots of sheltering trees. but they are having to go further and further for food—not good.

the adjustment is worth it. i did find one store online that sells very cheap whole corn kernels by the pound, which the squirrels and jays love.

there is a female squirrel who is very obviously and very definitely nursing some babies. i am trying to keep supporting her bc she unfortunately picked a very bad place to give birth (landscapers and horses and vehicles nearby tear through almost daily on the other side of my hedge).

i don’t want her to have to go far, especially with the heat getting more intense, and so i’ve been making sure she has corn cobs every day at the base of her tree. but those get expensive, so i’m excited to have found whole corn kernels so cheap.

also found one decent price for halved peanuts which all the birds are absolutely obsessed with.

and the rest i’m still reliant on Tractor Supply for. i’d love to stop giving their murderous animal agriculture supporting asses money, but i’d need to find a better priced Fruit and Nut seed than they offer, and i haven’t yet.

as for seed cakes for the woodpeckers—which, the vegetable gelatin ones i buy are the most expensive per unit that i’m spending on rn, bc there is absolutely no way i’m going to conscience animal gelatin—my experiment in making them myself is ongoing. i used too little agar agar powder in my last batch (and also didn’t get it boiling enough) so it just ended up being a sticky crumbly treat that i put on the ground for the scavengers.

i’ll try again this week bc i’d really love to keep supporting my native red-bellies, especially as it gets hotter and hotter into the summer and the birds get more exhausted at a much faster rate.

[justabirdy]

From the Feeder 5-17 to 5-23

I won't lie, I've had a rough week. Amidst multiple breaks of bad new in my life and getting sick, I've found myself in a funk. There's a chance I may not even have a job in the coming weeks or months, so the bird feeders and the livestream have been a comfort of mine and may even become more important as time progresses. 

But enough about hardship, lets look at some pretty birds and talk shop about the birdfeeder livestream. 

Our first new visitor of the week is in fact our turkey who finally decided it was worth coming all the way to the feeder.

Wild Turkey

I was also finally able to get photos of our House finches who made themselves right at home the past few days. 

House finch

Another exciting visitor that proved difficult to photograph was a Ruby-throated hummingbird that stopped by a few times just before dusk when my camera would have the most challenging time catching it.

Ruby-throated hummingbird

And finally, our surprise star visitor, at least in my book was in fact our Pileated woodpecker who decided to swoop in and make his presence known at both our suet blocks. I just happened to be lucky enough to be around and catch him both on a video clip and in photos below! I'm still stunned at how big they are. That also makes 4 species of woodpecker to visit now!

Pileated woodpecker

And of course we had some of our regulars! I'll add those to the bottom of this post. 

----------------------------

Stream Updates

Okay, we only made a few minor updates this week. Here's a rough breakdown of the improvements: 

Added a running timestamp to the stream to better help people look back through the stream to find things people may talk about in the chat. 

Moved the feeders slightly closer to the camera. This should help improve video quality while cameras are zoomed in. 

Investigated ways to lower the latency so there's not a 25 second lag between inputting a command in chat and seeing anything happen. (this frustrates me too since a bird may be gone by the time I zoom in or pull up the audio) 

The first two changes are simple quality of life, the last one is something where I want your feedback and input. The conclusion I've come to is that youtube will only allow ultra-low latency on videos that 1080p or less. If we dropped to 1080p we could have a lag of only 3-5 seconds at the expense of 4k. So which do you prefer? Less lag or 4k video. Please let me know and I'll take it into consideration.

Final Thing

One of these days when I'm not feeling sick, I'm thinking about doing a birdwatching livestream where we can all watch the bird feeders together and talk about the birds and behaviors they are showcasing. I'm by no means an expert, but I would enjoy sending a morning truly birdwatching with y'all. Let me know in a reply as well if this is of interest too

- Birdy

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Check out the Interactive Livestream Here

Support me on Ko-Fi

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White-breasted Nuthatch

Common Grackle

Indigo Bunting

Hairy Woodpecker

Red-bellied Woodpecker

Mourning Dove

Red-winged Blackbird

Baltimore Oriole

American Goldfinch

Rose-breasted grosbeak

Northern Cardinal

Blue Jay

Brown Thrasher

Black-capped Chickadee

[killhimagain]

List of birds I see in my backyard:

House sparrow

Chipping sparrow

House finch

Carolina chickadee

Northern cardinal

Tufted titmouse

Gray catbird

Brown headed cowbird

European starling

White breasted nuthatch

Downy woodpecker

Carolina wren

House wren

American robin

Blue jay

Mourning dove

Eastern bluebird

I've also seen a turkey vulture, american goldfinch, red belly woodpecker, american crows and common grackles occasionally. There are also chimney swifts that fly above my neighbors house.

[haveyouseenthisbirdpoll]

List of Birds organized by Order + locations:

Accipitriformes:

Bearded vulture

Cooper's hawk

Osprey

Red-shouldered hawk

Steller's sea eagle

Anseriformes:

Bar-headed goose

Barnacle goose

Black swan

Common merganser

Red-breasted goose

Snow goose

Trumpeter swan

Apodiformes:

Common swift

Ruby-throated hummingbird

Bucerotiformes:

Eurasian hoopoe

Cariamiformes:

Red-legged seriema

Casuariiformes:

Emu

Southern cassowary

Cathartiformes:

Black vulture

Turkey vulture

Charadriiformes:

American oystercatcher

Atlantic puffin

Black-headed gull

Black skimmer

Black-tailed godwit

European herring gull

Killdeer

Northern lapwing

Ruddy turnstone

Ciconiiformes:

White stork

Columbiformes:

Common wood pigeon

Eurasian collared dove

Luzon bleeding-heart

Nicobar pigeon

Victoria crowned pigeon

Coraciiformes:

Blue-capped kingfisher

Common kingfisher

Cuculiformes:

Asian koel

Greater roadrunner

Yellow-billed cuckoo

Eurypygiformes:

Kagu

Falconiformes:

American kestrel

Common kestrel

Galliformes:

Palawan peacock-pheasant

Scaled quail

Western capercaillie

Gaviiformes:

Common loon

Gruiformes:

American coot

Australasian swamphen/pūkeko

Blue crane

Common moorhen

Sandhill crane

Sora

Whooping crane

Passeriformes:

American bushtit

American robin

Australian raven

Baltimore oriole

Barn swallow

Black-billed magpie

Black-capped chickadee

Black-throated sparrow

Blue-headed vireo

Blue jay

Bluethroat

Brown thrasher

California towhee

Canada warbler

Canyon wren

Cedar waxwing

Common blackbird

Common chlorospingus

Common raven

Eastern wood pewee

Eurasian blue tit

Eurasian bullfinch

Eurasian golden oriole

Eurasian jay

Eurasian magpie

European robin

Goldcrest

Great-tailed grackle

Great tit

Hooded crow

House sparrow

Indigo bunting

Kirtland's warbler

LeConte's sparrow

Long-tailed tit

Mexican jay

Painted bunting

Phainopepla

Pine siskin

Pin-tailed whydah

Pinyon jay

Pygmy nuthatch

Red winged blackbird

Rook

Saltmarsh sparrow

Satin bowerbird

Spotted towhee

Steller's jay

Tufted titmouse

Wallcreeper

Warbling vireo

Western tanager

White-breasted nuthatch

White-throated dipper

White-throated magpie-jay

Yellow-rumped warbler

Pelecaniformes:

Brown pelican

Great blue heron

Great egret

Great white pelican

Least bittern

Roseate spoonbill

Shoebill stork

Snowy egret

Phoenicopteriformes:

American flamingo

Chilean flamingo

Piciformes:

Acorn woodpecker

Clark's nutcracker

Lewis's woodpecker

Northern flicker

Pileated woodpecker

Red-bellied woodpecker

Red-headed woodpecker

Podargiformes:

Tawny frogmouth

Podicipediformes:

Pied-billed grebe

Procellariiformes:

Wilson's storm-petrel

Psittaciformes:

Australian king parrot

Chestnut-fronted macaw

Citron-crested cockatoo

Cockatiel

Galah

Gang-gang cockatoo

Pacific parrotlet

Rose-ringed parakeet

Sulphur-crested cockatoo

Strigiformes:

Barn owl

Barred owl

Eurasian eagle-owl

Suliformes:

Anhinga

Blue-footed booby

Double-crested cormorant

Trogoniformes:

Elegant trogon

Locations:

Africa

America

Antarctica

Asia

Australia

Central America

Eurasia

Europe

North America

Oceania

South America

[ostdrossel]

The process

of choosing photos for my calendars is always a bit of a thing I love and hate. On the one hand, it is fun to revisit the year but on the other hand it is very hard to narrow a selection down. Usually what I do is go through older posts of the year and copy the ones I may consider into a special subfolder and then wittle things down.

Of these four, the immature male Rosebreasted Grosbeak and the Bluebird made the cut - they are April and May. The Grackle is an alternative I considered for March. I love Grackles in the rain but somehow I landed on the RWBB instead. The second Grosbeak I loved because of the slightly different coloring. It appears to be a female but I also see a tiny red dot on the fold in the belly and the vibrant yellow is a bit unusual. The photo is from May (the Serviceberry is blooming), and since I wanted the Bluebird for May (my birthday month), the Grosbeak was out.

You can find my calendars here.

[o-the-mts]

When there’s a bird party in your yard!

House sparrow

Carolina wren

Red-bellied woodpecker

Northern mockingbird

Common grackle

Red-wing blackbird

Northern cardinal

American robin

European starling

American goldfinch

Tufted titmouse

Song sparrow

Blue jay

White-throated sparrow

[infodumpingaboutnature]

Merry belated Christmas everyone!!! I’ve been wanting to make a post for a while now but things have been pretty hectic between coming back from my trip to Florida and helping my family with last minute preparations for Christmas. After that my brain needed a few days to just be goop but I’m back now and want to talk about something pretty cool! So while I was in Florida me and my bf went to go visit this wetlands called Green Cay where you can walk around a board walk and see some pretty cool birds and reptiles. The day we went was pretty cold and cloudy (it was like that for most of the time I was there) so that meant there weren’t many reptiles out but it also meant there weren’t many people there either so we got to see a lot of really cool birds!

As soon as we pulled up to the parking lot we were seeing birds such as blue jays, northern mocking birds, common grackles (of course), a red-bellied woodpecker, mourning doves, and a bunch of squirrels. I know none of those species are rare so it makes sense that I would see them but I think it’s so cool to see species that I’m used to like blue jays, squirrels, and woodpeckers hanging out in palm trees.

(Red-Bellied Woodpecker)

Next, we went into the visitor center where they had a few exhibits with animals. The first was a display about native frogs Vs invasive frogs that had Cuban tree frogs and cane toads for the invasive species and green tree frogs, pig frogs, and southern toads for the natives. Sadly, I could only find the Cuban tree frog, cane toad, and pig frog since the glass was super foggy and the frogs like to hide anyways. They also had an American kestrel named Kilee and an Eastern screech owl named Oliver in little flight cages. Both birds were born in the wild but now have injuries that prevent them from flying so they have to live the rest of their lives at the center. The sign said Oliver had been hit by a car and for Kilee it just said she had problems with her wing feathers so idk what happened to her. There was also two tanks one that had turtles (peninsula cooters, Florida softshell, and Florida red-bellied) and a second tank that had some baby American Alligators.

(Pig frog, Cuban tree frog, Kilee the American kestrel, Oliver the Eastern screech owl, peninsula cooter, and American alligator babies)

In the actual park we saw lots of cool species since there weren’t many people out. Like I said no alligators though since it was pretty cold out but we did see plenty of iguanas, a massive Florida Softshell in the water, and a basilisk lizard sitting in a tree!

(Large male green iguana and either a brown basilisk or a green basilisk who isn’t showing off his coloration we couldn’t tell)

That’s all the pics I can add to this post so I’m gonna make a part 2 with all the birds we saw.

[headspace-hotel]

saw four chickadees, pair of song sparrows, tree swallow, unidentified sparrow, several grackles, pair of starlings, three cardinals, countless robins, unidentified small gray bird, bluejay, red-bellied woodpecker, and yellow-rumped warbler

I keep thinking "maybe I just notice the birds more now?" but then I go outside and there is So Many Birds