Archive for November, 2009
« Previous EntriesBaghdad Update 4
Submitted by The Birdcouple Blog
I went walking in a park in Baghdad for the first time since I got here four weeks ago. It was pure bliss. The sun was shining, the sky was blue, Baghdadis were out celebrating the Eid festival, a 4 (or more) day holiday that this year roughly coincided with [...]
DINNER!
Submitted by The Birdcouple Blog
The Wild Turkey, a North American native, enjoys foraging in hardwood forests with scattered openings feasting on acorns, seeds, insects, fern fronds and the occasional salamander.
The male Wild Turkey is quite the flirt.
It all starts in late February.
The male (aka the Tom) will gobble to attract a gal and [...]
BirdCouple does Kurdistan!!!!
Submitted by The Birdcouple Blog
They made this one for us, darling. Happy Thanksgiving. Wish you were here. Or I was there.
Rating 3.00 out of 5
[?]
Happy Thanksgiving!
Submitted by BrdPics Blog
The turkey may be good, but I recommend the all-you-can eat seafood!
Rating 3.00 out of 5
[?]
I’m ok… really… it is all perfectly normal… really…
Submitted by The Birdcouple Blog
Right.
Yes.
I am perfectly normal.
In fact, I think if you asked any woman who was desperately missing her Cute Husband, she would do the same thing as me…
It all started when I realized that the birds were coming to the feeders and then staring inside the house at me. You see, [...]
Baghdad Update 3
Submitted by The Birdcouple Blog
Warren has been filing quick posts during his six-week reporting assignment in Iraq….
I’m actually not in Baghdad (or Kansas) anymore. Am spending three to four days in northern Iraq, the primarily Kurdish region of the country. Today, we were in the cities of Kirkuk and Irbil, from where I’m now [...]
Red-bellied Woodpeckers Continue Their Work
Submitted by Birding Notes Blog
A female and a male Red-bellied Woodpecker are continuing to excavate what I assume is a roost hole in a tall dead pine. Both yesterday and today, one of the two were at work in the same spot each time I went outside to look for them. They work so quietly [...]
Gray Catbird and Song Sparrow
Submitted by Birding Notes Blog
The surprise of the day was finding a Gray Catbird feeding on clusters of dark purple fruit in a privet thicket among all the withered, tangled brown weeds in the old field. The Catbird was quiet and stayed mostly screened in the brush, but came out in the open long enough [...]
Duck n donuts
Submitted by Bird TLC Blog
I got a call from Valerie at the Bird TLC office right about lunch time. She said a lady had called and said she had a duck. I asked what was wrong with it. She said the lady said it won’t leave. I said that it had missed migration and [...]
Cindy and Hal
Submitted by Bird TLC Blog
Cindy started working with Hal a few months ago after his caretaker moved away. Eagles can take on new presenters / caretakers, it just takes a little for them to get use to them. Cindy is not one to push training to get it done fast. She likes to take [...]
Baghdad Update 2
Submitted by The Birdcouple Blog
There are birds in the Middle East, no doubt. But are there birds in Baghdad? Not many, to be honest. I’ve seen just a handful of species (see posts below), to which I can now proudly add the very rare (not!) Hooded Crow.
I’ve astutely narrowed down the lack of avian [...]
Our Winter Cooper’s Hawk
Submitted by Birding Notes Blog
The bold gray swoop of a Cooper’s Hawk always takes me by surprise. Although they’re here year-round, dramatic, impressive raptors that perch and hunt low, they’re secretive and quiet, especially during the warmer, sunnier months. So I always feel lucky to see one now and then.
The past few years though, there’s [...]
Two Red-bellied Woodpeckers and a Roost Hole – A Pair? Or Not?
Submitted by Birding Notes Blog
Early this afternoon – a warm, sunny day with a flannel blue sky, not a cloud in sight, and light breezes sending down showers of brown leaves from the oaks – I watched a female Red-bellied Woodpecker working on a hole high up in a tall dead pine tree just inside [...]
Easton Waterfowl Festival!
Submitted by The Birdcouple Blog
The 39th Annual, no less!I’m so lucky to have such wonderful friends to invite me to join them on such wonderful events while Cute Husband is away…
Paul Baicich escorted me to the Easton Waterfowl Festival to enjoy a damp Saturday of everything waterfowl and some really tasty Maryland Crab Soup.
Easton [...]
2 Great horned owls released
Submitted by Bird TLC Blog
The host with the mostest, Gus a great horned owl who is caretaked by Bird TLC volunteer Gina, hosted 2 great horned owl releases at their home yesterday. The weather cooperated some, the temperature was around 15°.
Both owls were a little hesitant to leave at first, but once they got [...]
A Tale of Two Grebes
Submitted by BrdPics Blog
A staple of my fall birding activities is scoping area reservoirs for interesting waterfowl, waterbirds, and gulls. As I was waiting out a Parasitic Jaeger between bouts of chasing gulls the other day it occurred to me how different fall Podiceps grebes showing non-breeding plumage are in comparison to their showy breeding [...]
Susitna Elementary
Submitted by Bird TLC Blog
Gina with Arc the great horned owl and myself with Ghost the snowy owl had an awesome presentation at Susitna Elementary. The students were very interested in owls and we were flooded with comments and questions.
We were asked how many bones do owls have and we were stumped. So I [...]
Baghdad Update 1
Submitted by The Birdcouple Blog
Well, not much new to report (bird-wise) after my first 10 days here in Baghdad, capital of the Land of the Two Rivers.
Most of the “birds” I see and hear are military helicopters, both U.S. and Iraqi security forces, flying over the city. I was at a reception at the [...]
November Twilight – Partial Song of a Hermit Thrush
Submitted by Birding Notes Blog
Just after sundown last night, the sky was clear, violet-gray, orange on the horizon, and the last warm, hoarded light made maples, oaks, sweet gums and tulip poplars glow as if lit from within, briefly, before they faded. Gone are the long, lingering twilights of summer. There were few birds to [...]
Nothing Like a Good Book… Especially when it teaches you one of the keys to helping our feathered friends…
Submitted by The Birdcouple Blog
Kay Charter of Saving Birds Thru Habitat passed along this gem of a book, Bringing Nature Home , by Dr. Douglas Tallamy. Dr. Tallamy chairs the Department of Entomology and Wildlife Ecology at University of Delaware.
And, he owns 10 acres of farmland that was once loaded with invasives. Which, he [...]
More bad and good.
Submitted by Bird TLC Blog
I guess the best thing about volunteering at a wildbird rehabilitation center, is its success stories. It’s awesome when you have a bird that overcomes all obstacles. The one you wonder how it survived. Hopefully you get to see it released or placed as an education bird somewheres where people will [...]
The Creation of a Thousand Forests….
Submitted by The Birdcouple Blog
…is in one acorn.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson
Ahh… fall on the East Coast!
It is the time of year in Maryland when trees are literally raining leaves.
But according to this from NPR, leaves aren’t exactly falling…
But, rather, the trees are shoving the leaves off the limbs.
In Cute Husband’s absence, I have further
fallen [...]
Birding a Bit in Baghdad
Submitted by The Birdcouple Blog
W is starting a six-week reporting assignment in Iraq. While it’s much less violent here than it was just a few years ago, it’s very far from stable - and he can’t exactly go wandering with bins looking for parks and rivers with birds in ‘em.
So far, birding has been [...]
Winter Birds
Submitted by Birding Notes Blog
Winter Birds
The arrival of beautiful new twin grand-daughters, Luna and Stella, has kept me busy and rather distracted from birding as much as usual for the past few weeks, but now and then I’ve gotten out to enjoy some picture-perfect autumn days and to welcome back some of our returning winter [...]
Ruby-crowned Kinglet
Submitted by Birding Notes Blog
Late in the morning on a clear, sunny, colorful fall day, October 20, I heard the stuttering chatter of a Ruby-crowned Kinglet for the first time this season, coming from some low thickets along the roadside as I walked, a familiar dry, percussive little voice that is so natural a part [...]
