You are browsing the archives of feeder birds.

This winter I have taken on the responsibility of keeping the two feeding stations at Forest Park supplied two days a week, on Thursdays and Fridays.  I’ve made sure to get there both days during periods of inclement or extremely cold weather but if the weather is warm and nothing is falling from the sky [...]

While home for holidays in I didn’t just go chasing after a Northern Hawk Owl.  I also watched the feeders frequently, often outside my parents’ house hidden in a woodpile.  Seriously.  In a woodpile.  You see, the woodpile is next to the deck which is where the feeders are, and the deck is attached to [...]

Though I did enjoy my birding with Will across the wilds of Greene and Albany Counties, most of my birding over the Thanksgiving Day weekend was done at my parents’ and and my aunt and uncle’s feeders.  My dad  had only put his feeders up about a week earlier and hadn’t drawn much of a [...]

Just like so many of you, we love an avian identification challenge. Thanks to the 10,000 Birds Clinic, we certainly get our share. The beauty of this arrangement is that even when the three of us are stumped, we have a veritable birding brain trust to turn to. That’s where you come in! Wendy from [...]

Though I’ve been back in the city for almost a week I haven’t come close to using up all of my upstate birding tales yet!  Like the last time I visited my folks I spent some time photographing hummingbirds, but this time I was at my Aunt Bonnie and Uncle Paul’s house taking advantage of [...]

During my second trip upstate in the last three weeks (and after my second Big Day in as many weekends) I was up for some relaxation Sunday, and got it with my family. Of course, for me, relaxation includes watching birds, so the Ruby-throated Hummingbirds coming to my parents’ feeders featured prominently in my relaxation [...]

This weekend Daisy and I traveled upstate to my hometown of Saugerties for a wedding. We had a blast and my good friend Mary (whom I’ve known since we were geeky adolescents ) looked beautiful as she married Mathew, and I wish them the best. Now that we are geeky adults we are less concerned [...]

After my exhausting birding adventures with Mike, Charlie, Jean, and Patrick, which will soon be described in great detail, I’m sure, I had Mike drop me off at, no, not my apartment, but Forest Park! The sun was out and the afternoon was still young. My energy level was at a pretty low ebb though, [...]

Curt McDermott is a birder in Orange County, New York. He has an amazing array of feeders up in his small suburban yard that attracted an amazing bird and flocks of birders this winter. As of this posting the bird is still being seen daily. Curt has been a gracious host to the birding hordes [...]

My contribution to the Great Backyard Bird Count this year, the first year I have participated, consisted of me sitting at the windows of both my aunt and uncle’s house and my parents’ house watching the feeders.  Of course I am aware that the Great Backyard Bird Count can include birds counted anywhere but I [...]

Chipping Sparrow, macro-style On Friday, at my Aunt Bonnie and Uncle Paul’s house in Saugerties, NY, I enjoyed myself watching their feeders and photographing the freeloaders. Their two clear-plastic feeders suction-cupped to their living room window had a steady stream of visitors but only titmice, chickadees and Chipping Sparrows would let me get close enough [...]

The nasally honking “song” of White-breasted Nuthatches is, uh, well, I had to constrain the word “song” within quotation marks, so it’s not exactly Pavarotti I’m talking about here. This time of year White-breasted Nuthatches are not a bird most birders pay attention to. On a walk through snow-muffled forests in the dead of winter, [...]

In yesterday’s post, I flippantly stated that feeders are cheaters, which some might have interpreted as a slur against backyard birding. Nothing could be further from the truth. I am a huge fan of the feeder watch. In fact, quite a few of my lifers — sparrows, chickadees, and finches — have been spotted at [...]