2:26 AM – The One-eared Squirrel is still around. We’re always glad to see him, though we’d like it if he ate dinner somewhere else.
There are a lot of doves around. Too many, really. They’re packing the feeder, squabbling and pecking, forcing out the other birds – even the Jays.
1:24 AM – The Cardinals are getting their head feathers back, vivid red and thick, and it seems to make them aggressive. This video shows one male loudly confronting several doves.
We are delighted to see that the One-eared Squirrel is still around. We’re not so delighted to see that he seems to have adapted to the hot pepper seed. That stuff seems to repel most other squirrels, but most other squirrels aren’t as tough and resilient as the One-ear.
3:24 AM – This is the first sight of a bluebird in several weeks. They used to be all over the place. Here’s one at the cylinder feeder, then some bluebird activity at the platform feeder. These are all juveniles, and so have spots and stripe, and not too much blue on them.
We don’t see many squirrels in the platform feeder since we started using pepper seed – that is, seed impregnated with some kind of hot pepper flavoring. It doesn’t bother the birds, but it usually repels the squirrels and raccoons. Except for this tough customer, who seems to have developed an immunity.
5:57 AM – We moved some feeders around, placing one of the Squirrel Busters on a tree. Although the Busters are very effective, when they’re close to a tree trunk they’re more accessible to critters, like this midnight raccoon. In the first part he’s able to get some seed, then he trips the shut-down lever and becomes discouraged. For now, anyway. We’ll have to put hot pepper seed in these feeders, eventually.
Dove against dove at the platform feeder. One of these looks smaller and younger than the other, so it’s probably a case of teaching a young Mourning Dove his place.
2:43 AM – We recently put a cylinder of compressed seed impregnated with some kind of hot pepper material. It works very well to keep the squirrels from hogging the feeders. Here it is in action, repelling a squirrel who tries a few bites.
We have seen a ton of Blue Jays lately. The Identification Project is still going on, but we’ve become confused by the similar markings. How many ‘families’ we’ve got now is uncertain. They’re showing up in pairs lately, and not fighting, so presumably they’re related.
5:01 AM – Another Retro-Sunday.
At the time this was recorded, March 22, 2017, I didn’t realize that a molting bird can lose his tail feathers. This Carolina Wren was not the victim of anything as dramatic as a last second escape from a pouncing cat. Probably.
Here’s one from March 21, 2017 of a bluebird at the ‘suet’ feeder. That’s actually compressed seeds, not suet, but we got used to calling it suet because it’s served in the suet cage. The bluebird seems to like it just fine.
We like this one because of the squirrels panicked expression. It’s a joke because we never made a serious try to hurt one. Even when we used the slingshot and a steel ball bearing, the shot was so weak (on purpose) it just bounced off a squirrels back – he didn’t even move, just sat there until he was ready to scamper off. From March, 28, 2017.
3:52 AM – The Mourning Doves are now the most frequent visitor to the open platform feeders, and it looks like they’re feeling possessive. This one sure doesn’t want Blue Jays hanging around.
Since the cylinder suet cage is back in action, we’ve been getting a steady stream of bird customers (and a couple of attempts by squirrels). These were there over the last few days: Downy Woodpecker,White Breasted Nuthatch, Bluebird, Cardinal, Carolina Chickadee and Red-bellied Woodpecker. The Cardinal is new to the suet feeder, probably because the mealworm feeder wasn’t up that day. Same for the bluebird with the attractive pattern of back feathers.
Here’s that squirrel we mentioned. He takes a good sniff and decided to have lunch somewhere else. We really like pepper suet.
5:06 AM – Retro-Sunday, once again.
From April, 2017, father bluebird taking care of the first generation of young.
Cedar Waxwings swarming the birdbath, in April 2017. We hope they come back on their way up north.
March, 2017. Raccoon spills mealworms out of the feeder onto the ground, for easy access. Raccoons are clever.
11:07 AM – The new pepper suet is a success. The birds like it, and we’ve seen no squirrels on it yet. Here’s a Tufted Titmouse, and a Red-bellied Woodpecker.
This bluebird checks out the new pepper suet cylinder, and decides it’s not for him. I wonder if it were compressed seeds if he would like it.
This video shows a squirrel sampling the next pepper seed/feed. He stops eating right away, gets a drink of water, and scampers off. That’s what’s supposed to happen. I’m disappointed to report that later in the day another squirrel spent five minutes hogging down the hot seeds. It didn’t seem to bother him at all. I guess the effectiveness depends on the squirrel, but we have had very few lengthy squirrel visits since we put out the hot stuff.
5:30 AM – This Cardinal is right in the middle of a serious head-molting. My question is, is this the same one we saw with a naked head several days ago, or is it a different cardinal. We saw a cardinal whose head was almost completely recovered, but this bare patches on his back. I know we have at least two males, maybe more, and I can’t really tell them apart. I need to get out the binoculars and really look at them. Maybe capture and tag them. Maybe not.
The camera we had on the seed cylinder has been taken down. Some critter has kicked the camera off it’s vertical axis, as this video of a squirrel feeding illustrates. And it’s not the first time. When we get the “pepper” cylinder up, we’ll restore the camera