Short posts highlighting a recent subject
Loggerhead Shrikes are nicknamed Butcherbird (not to be confused with true butcherbirds of Australia). An apt moniker as demonstrated by the shrike and unfortunate grasshopper below. Loggerhead Shrikes are song birds that are Raptor-mini-me’s. Skilled hunters from perches, they use their strong hooked beaks’ “tomial teeth”, pointy projections on the upper cutting edge, to dispatch […]
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Great Blue Herons are favorites of mine. They are tough & adaptive survivors. They have survived everything we have thrown at them. They even seem to take sweet revenge by raiding urban koi ponds and in an infamous case here in metro-Atlanta stealing trout off the lines of fishermen on the Chattahoochee River. But just […]
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These are the barred owls that make Clyde Shepherd Nature Preserve home. In these shots they are taking well deserved naps. Their nest box has 3 active owlets & like all youngsters the owlets are either sleeping or wanting to eat. These two are Poster Birds for active parenting. After mating and up to laying […]
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I think it’s clear that I love conservation comeback stories. It’s maybe more accurate to say coming-back stories. There’s not many better than the Osprey’s. They were big time victims of the 1950-70s pesticide onslaught that took down many of our bird species, especially large raptors. DDT being the primary villain. Many local Osprey populations […]
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Eastern Bluebird enjoying a Spring day – in February Decatur Georgia’s Legacy Park (formerly Decatur Methodist Children’s Home) open fields have been replanted with native grasses and bluebird boxes have been added to supplement the natural cavities in tree snags that are safe to leave standing. There are plenty of fence posts and telephone lines, […]
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When the cold fronts start moving through the South, the birdwatching web sites light up with posts from many new birders along the lines of: “Bless their hearts, are my poor little babies going to freeze to death?” The answers back are along the lines of: One way birds stay warm is by using their […]
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I’ve seen it hundreds of times. A bird of prey that has been sitting quietly still and unnoticed deep in a tree canopy suddenly explodes into flight. Maneuvers through the branches and limbs of the treetops to take its prey. I’m awestruck every time. This Red-tailed Hawk hunting in our yard on two recent days […]
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Female Baltimore Oriole. Or maybe immature male. Males don’t molt to their bright adult orange until their second year. This bird was visiting our yard in Decatur, Georgia which is deep inside metro-Atlanta on January 29th. I had to add Baltimore Oriole to my yard’s eBird checklist. And was lucky to have photos. They are […]
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Pine Warblers live year round with us. They don’t head to the tropics in winter like their neotropical cousins. They are literally and figuratively a bright spot on drab, grey, winter days. Especially our days of ‘wintry mix’. What holds them here is their fondness for, guess what, pine nuts. Something we have a lot […]
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I like Vireos (& Shrikes). To me they are a raptor mini-me. All have stout bills. Many have hooked bills –‘tomial tooth’. Both perfect features to kill and dismember prey, including insects and for some of the ‘larger’ species (they are all small compared to the big guys) small birds, mammals and reptiles. It is […]
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