Thanks so much, Stewriffic. I miss birding. The one biggest regret about moving to a basement-level condo is that I can't watch the birds in the morning anymore. We had all sorts of cardinals, tufted titmice, orioles and hummingbirds at the place ... and there was a big hawk sometimes perched at the very top of the trees with a ... hawkeye trained on the birdfeeder, just waiting for his/her lunch to come in for a landing.

thats cool . i'm gonna have to pass this link along on my blog . thanks

I enjoy birding, sort of passively these days in that I don't go out on birding walks specifically. And I'm not that good of a birder because my vision isn't too sharp. Still, I learned my birds fairly well when teaching environmental ed, and I get untold pleasure out of watching the feeder outside my desk window at home. And yesterday, I was walking for a short time in the Rachel Carson Wildlife Refuge in Wells, ME, and I thought I saw (and heard) a bald eagle. The NWR's site tells me that I shouldn't be seeing them because they are only resident in winter, but I'm not so sure. Not many things have a big black body and a white head.

This is a GREAT link, by the way. This is the kind of thing we wanted the web for.

Birding was a requirement in my high school biology classes. We regularly took field-trips across the state to birdwatch. The big highlight was the annual trip all teh way down to Waycross, Georgia and several days birdwatching in the Okefenokee swamp. I've been a casual birder ever since.

One of the best birding stories I have from that time doesn't even involve seeing a bird...We were doing a late-winter birding trip in the woods around a local reservoir. We came to a small pond in the woods. It was frozen-over and covered by a light dusting of snow. The snow was pristine except for a set of rabbit tracks that started at the edge of the pond and continued out to the center of the pond. The tracks stopped there. In the snow, on either side of the point where the rabbit tracks ended, were the fine, finger-like impressions of the wingtip feathers of a hawk.

An entire story told in a single, quiet image.

Miko: It's still winter for many birds, and I have no doubt you saw a bald eagle. As you said, they're pretty unmistakable.

Cornell just redid the All About Birds website, which I'd already been using as my go-to for more bird info. Now it's SO much easier to use, and the bird guide is just a fabulous resource.

Hrm. It looks like the redesign went live yesterday. Crazy. For some reason I thought it had been released some time ago.

Yes, I bird, recently it's only been from my windows however. I did note that the Dark Eyed Junco's have left; Chipping Sparrows have arrived, and I'm waiting for the first arrivals of hummingbirds. In 2007 they showed up at my house on Mother's Day; last year they were early and arrived in late April. Given that it's still relatively chilly, my guess is that they will be a bit late.

Miko, we have bald eagles here year round. I'm lucky enough to see one on my drive to work most days. And one flew over my house (at least I think it was a bald eagle. It was very high in the sky, and a Turkey Vulture lazily circled it, as if checking it out, and the other bird was MUCH bigger than the Vulture) last summer, perhaps checking out the area?

Birds!

I like birds, but I dislike the verbing of the noun.

I'm into birds because a) I like animals in general, b) birds are interesting to watch and often quite pretty, and c) I really, really like knowing the names of things. So I guess I "bird," but I also "plant." (See, that's why I don't like the verb.)

Thanks for the link, Stew. The Cornell site is always awesome.

I Like Birds

I herd birds

This post really made me miss my old house - even if you are talking bout a whole nother hemisphere. I was so blessed growing up there right on the edge of an old man-made lake that had grown pretty wild. There were a pair of black swans that would nest every year, wood ducks, swamp hens, the odd pelican, Japanese snipe would visit each northern winter and you would see the occasional wedge-tailed eagle swoop by. And if I rowed my dad's old dingy over the other side of the lake and set it into a bed of reeds, I could watch kingfishers diving and listen to them feeding their chicks.

We had parrots nesting in one of our pine trees (oh the noise!!!) and did our fair share of rescuing various feathered creatures. My favourite was a cuckoo-shrike that we found that couldn't fly very well. Took it in to the local guy and it turned out that it had gorged itself on mum's mulberry tree, the fruit had fermented in its gut and it was completely drunk.

Ach, time to stop rabbiting on and on... Thank for posting, Stewriffic. And Thorsdad - thats a great story!