This day's for the birds...

A couple of weeks ago, Kev set up 2 birdfeeders right outside of the dining room window so that I can see it when I'm sitting at the computer. This is the view of it from upstairs, Sammy's bedroom window.


For the first week, I didn't see one bird at it... but I suppose they've now grown comfortable with it, and the birds started to arrive. Just a couple of birds the first day, and now there are a lot of visitors. Mostly black-capped chickadees. Chickadees in abundance. I love the adorable chickadees.


Chickadees are always the first to return to the feeder when the birds have been scared away for some reason...


Also, many, many titmice. The tufted titmouse is a much more timid bird than the chickadee. Most of the photos I took through the windows from inside the house, but I spent some time outside today trying to get some nicer shots. The chickadees complied, but the titmice were wary. Vocal, but wary.


All the other birds stayed away while I was outside. From inside the house, I got several shots of blue jays. They are the pigs of the birdfeeder, gobbling up as much as they can. I know some people don't like them at their feeders because of that, but I like them. They're a beautiful blue against the snow and the gray trees, and I like their loud squawks.


Another bird finally starting to show up is the white-breasted nuthatch. I love to watch these birds creeping down the maple trees upside-down (headfirst).


Earlier today I saw a downy woodpecker at the feeder, in the smoke bush that's right next to it... but it was too quick and I couldn't get a photo. I did get a shot of this red-bellied woodpecker, though. He's been hanging around quite a bit.


I saw only one sparrow, this tree sparrow.


But then while I was typing this post, I noticed about 4 of them at the feeder, along with several dark-eyed juncos that have just turned up. I'm hoping that we'll get more and more birds showing up at my feeders. Just hopefully not any damn turkeys. We eventually quit feeding the birds at our old birdfeeder because we couldn't keep the turkeys away, and they would eat all the food and keep away all the songbirds... along with leaving great big globs of turkey poop all over. I don't think the turkeys are brave enough to come up this close to the house where we have my 2 new feeders. They're only about 4 feet away from the house and situated between the house and our sidewalk... hopefully far too much activity for the turkeys.

But not the squirrels. I had almost as much fun watching the squirrels today as I did the birds. At one point there were three of them vying for food. This big, fat one was the Top Squirrel.


He (or she) would chase the other 2 away whenever they ventured too close and/or when he wasn't too busy stuffing his fat cheeks to notice them. One squirrel would go up the smoke bush every time he was chased by the other.


Then he'd go back for more. When I went outside to take photos, one of them ran up the maple tree and chewed me out. Loud little bugger. Cute, though.