calling all wild bird feeders!!

[Bunnylady]

Um, NFC, don't the robins overwinter in your area? I used to see big flocks of robins when we visited family in Georgia and Florida during the winter. If you only saw one by itself, I gotta wonder about it - Flori-duh robin indeed! (maybe its family excommunicated it, thinking it had been hangin' with chickadees?)

 

[sourland]

My crows are disappearing. Last year my resident pair raised 3 young. I feed them daily right after I feed my dogs - they wait for me at a safe distance. Last week only 4 were present, and today I only see 3. Predation (from a GHO) or dispersal of adult offspring? With other pairs previous season young have always stayed around to help with the subsequent brood. Several years ago West Nile Virus wiped out my resident pair, and this pair did not set up shop until 2014. The young of that year died of what appeared to be West Nile also.

I want my crows back!

 

[N F C]

Um, NFC, don't the robins overwinter in your area? I used to see big flocks of robins when we visited family in Georgia and Florida during the winter. If you only saw one by itself, I gotta wonder about it - Flori-duh robin indeed! (maybe its family excommunicated it, thinking it had been hangin' with chickadees?)

Oh ok, you're right. But it was the first one I've seen this year! And he was by himself...hmm, maybe he was being shunned for having a chickadee girlfriend?

Actually, I was just reading that they overwinter year round in the lower 48 states so pretty much everyone in the continental U.S. should be seeing them. (According to Birds & Blooms)

 

[duluthralphie]

We see them up here once in a while during the winter. Most we see are either drunk or not all there.

 

[N F C]

We see them up here once in a while during the winter. Most we see are either drunk or not all there.

Now wait a minute Ralphie...are you talking about birds or your neighbors?

 

[birdfreak1831]

My crows are disappearing. Last year my resident pair raised 3 young. I feed them daily right after I feed my dogs - they wait for me at a safe distance. Last week only 4 were present, and today I only see 3. Predation (from a GHO) or dispersal of adult offspring? With other pairs previous season young have always stayed around to help with the subsequent brood. Several years ago West Nile Virus wiped out my resident pair, and this pair did not set up shop until 2014. The young of that year died of what appeared to be West Nile also.

I want my crows back!

This is terrific! Seems like I might not be, as I thought, the only birdfreak here!
Crows of all kinds and sizes have always been irresistible to me. I have raised lots of young ones, many of them severely ill and/or injured.
I have birdfeeders hanging inside my chicken enclosure. Am working on putting netting on top of it but making sure there are enough gaps for smaller birds up to jay size to get in. There are dozens of scrub jays who swoop down daily into the enclosure to pick up what others throw onto the ground from the hanging feeders. This winter there are 50-60 turkeys around which are great life entertainment too. Bunches fly onto my metal roof to stampede around there, making an impressive racket. I feed them snacks outside of the chicken enclosure, and some walk right up the steps to my front door.
I could talk about birds forever but better yet, I like to have as many around as I can attract.

I fell in love with chickens only three years ago. A small rooster appeared under my living room window in a snowstorm. No idea where he came from.
But he was badly battered, with all his primary feathers missing and a large open wound on his back.
I caught him and cared for him inside and he became a wonderful companion and teacher to me, just like "my" crows had been.
Some neighbors gifted me with a tiny disabled hen and the two of them became very close.

I left the two of them in the care of neighbors while I had to leave home for several months. The little guy died unexpectedly [had not showed any signs of illness]. The tiny hen rejoined the neighbors chickens.
I got a coop set up and doubled the chicken enclosure/pen. Wrapping up the last loose ends to get the hen back together with a new rooster, another sweet little bantam fellow.

Well, `nuf ranting for one day.

birdfreak

 

[sourland]

Hey, birdfreak - you are not alone. I have been a 'featheraholic' my entire life. Also raised an abandoned crow who would follow my buddy and I wherever we went.

 

[duluthralphie]

Welcome to the thread!

I love my wild birds almost as much as my domesticated ones and the guineas. I am never sure if they are domesticated or not.

I have an array of bird feeders right outside our dining room window. I love it. MY wife thinks it is ugly. Her loss.....

If she is going to be married to a great guy like me she has to accept my birds too!.

I use to have wild turkeys in the yard all the time, but when I got the Domesticated ones the wild quit coming around. I have heard wild hens in the spring answering my toms, but so far they have not come into the yard.

 

[Humbug3445]

I was feeding the birds and. I had a flock of grackles come by and my car looked like a. Dalmation. The grackles are brown in a very large flock. And poop on every thing. They sat over my car and let it have it i didnt w a nt the acid in the bird poop to eat . My car paint

 

[duluthralphie]

They are terrible birds, rank right on the bottom with cowbirds.


I put nigel seed back in the gold finch feeder and they left. I bought them safflower seeds and sunflower seeds (shelled) today, Hopefully, they will get off their high horse and come back to my feeders.