Birds, Birds and More Birds

This morning, a black-headed grosbeak, with his Barbra Streisand nose, sat on a post cap on the deck and waited for me to bring out the seed feeders. We have the hangers placed in such a way that the squirrels cannot get to them, so it took me a while to fish for the hanger. I had to use a wire with a hook bent on the end to retrieve the one the grosbeak was waiting for. Before I could even get the feeder up, he was on one of the perches. I believe he would take a sunflower out of my hand if I offered it, which I may do next time. The other evening I noticed that he, or one of the others like him, has taken up residence in one of the bluebird boxes. Not what I had intended it for, but it has been unoccupied so I guess the grosbeak has claimed squatter's rights.

As soon as the grosbeak lit, but before I could get the second feeder hung up, two white-breasted nuthatch had joined in feeding on the first one I'd put up. These are the early feeders. Next come the pygmy nuthatches and the first wave of the pine siskins. Before the morning is over, the pine siskins will have taken over both feeders, occupying every perch and fighting with each other for position. There are even some pushy males who will fly at the feeding siskins, in hopes of scaring them from their perch. If the feeding bird is shy, this tactic works, but usually, they stand their ground.

By this time, the feeders are about half empty, and the level of the seed will have dropped below the upper feeding holes. Birds will continue to perch near these holes, and I have seen the pine siskin peck at the side of the clear feeders, as if they think if they try hard enough, they can get to the seed they can plainly see. It seems to frustrate them, and I usually try to keep the level above all the feeding holes. Often a pygmy nuthatch will just go right inside the feeder to get at the seed. They are small enough to thread themselves through the feeding holes, but sometimes they can't get out. More than once, I've had to fish the feeder in with my hooked wire, and open the top to let the pygmies fly out that way. So far, we have not had one die inside the feeder, but it's a concern.

As the day wears on, the hummingbirds become more active. We have rufous and broad-tailed hummers, primarily. Neither of these are birds found in Texas, so it delights me to have them here on the nectar feeders in New Mexico. They fight constantly for control of the juice. The rufous are especially feisty, as well as especially small. They are sometimes called Lucifer, and once you see them in flight you can understand why. They are flame colored, and look like little flying orange and yellow balls of fire. They have fiery personalities as well.

One likes to perch on the eagle tip of our flag pole. From that vantage point he can watch both the feeders we have hung from the porch rafters. One of the rufous got so controlling, that I was forced to hang a third feeder around the corner by the back door, so that he could not possibly guard all three feeders at once. Now he  is constantly in flight in his efforts to keep the other hummers off of his "newest" juice source. Since I added the third feeder we have been overrun with other hummingbirds. We counted twelve on one of the small porch feeders. It only had four feeding holes, so there was a constant battle going on. They chatter and divebomb each other. They like the green glass feeder the best, which I find odd, since I don't put color in my juice. I had always been of the impression they are drawn to red feeders. Not so here. Although, the other day I was wearing one of my flowery house dresses and two hummingbirds apparently mistook me for a big flower. Both seemed to want to feed on my dress.

These hummers aren't interested in the pansy blooms. I have decided pansies have probably been so hybridized that the flavor, or maybe even the nectar, has been bred out of them. I have seen the hummers pierce the tomato blossoms, and the wild penstemon in the yard seems to be another favorite. None of the flowers, however, can compare with the juice in the feeders. They go wild for it.

In the evening, just before dusk, the crows, or more correctly ravens, began to fly up the mountain to roost. All day long they fill the air with their cacophony of calls. They have one that sounds like a quacking duck. I think that must be some kind of mating call, because one was doing it on a nearby limb with a female standing beside him. After making the call for a while, he jumped on her back. Jumped on and then off, immediately. It didn't seem long enough to do any actual mating, but perhaps it was a quickie. Anyway, in the evening there seems to be one bird who calls the others up the mountain. I fancy that one being the imam yelling "Allah!" It kind of sounds like that, a call to evening prayer. They respond by the hundreds, and take a full thirty minutes to all make the flight up the mountain to their mysterious roost.

The acorn woodpeckers have not been active lately, which suits me. They disrupt everything with their rude intrusions. They get on top of the hummingbird feeders and try to stick their bills in the holes. They don't succeed but they do cause the feeder to swing violently and spill juice out onto the ground below. We try to keep it as neat as possible around here to prevent bear incursions. We take in all the feeders at night. We have done this ever since a bear got to one of the peanut butter suet feeders back in June. The bear broke through the gate we have at the top of the spiral stairway that comes onto the porch. It took one afternoon to repair the gate, so we have not put out the suet feeder since then. I have another cake of peanut butter suet in the refrigerator, but think I'll wait until bear season is over to put it out again.

We also have Stellar's Jays, a gaudy bird with a Carmen Miranda topknot. They are a quiet bird, but I imagine that they can secretly speak Spanish. Their colors are beautiful, dusky blue and black. They're big but shy, usually choosing to feed on the millet and corn the other birds throw out on the ground. They will fly at an instant if either of us steps out the door. The other birds that feed on the ground surplus are the doves and the ravens, and also a half-tame doe we have named Crazy Sally. She seems to be an outcast from the neighborhood herd that roams around here.

I like to think we live in a bird sanctuary. It often seems that way. The birds don't seem to mind it when we join them out on the deck. They seem oblivious to the dog, too, and anyway, she's too busy trying to see squirrels in the trees. It's almost like the birds know this. One pygmy nuthatch who was perched on the waterer yesterday, even let the dog touch her nose to its tail before it flew away. I have had a pygmy take seed from my hand, just a touch-and-go that lasted maybe a second.

Some of the other birds we have that occasionally make forays through the mountains are red-wing blackbirds who come by the hundreds. Also little chipping sparrows who stopped here for a few months on their migration early last spring. We have had two or three mountain bluebirds, but they never seem to stay long on this mountain. We often see them in the valley, along with the meadowlarks and magpies. I wish they could come reclaim their boxes, but maybe there's just too much competition for them here. And anyway, we really do have enough birds to watch.

Onward ....