The Morning Dove

The morning dove is a bird that I've been reluctant to tackle. This is because of it's seeming to be present in the sense of ALWAYS around with a subtle elegance. It's this elegance that I find to be somewhat annoying because if I'm in a hurry (usually driving a car) and a morning dove is around it takes off and makes a specific bird-call upon take off. This bird-call sounds like panic. Panic in a muted, hushed tone.

The Whip Poor Will: the Chameleon of birds

This Whip poor will

is a bird that looks sleepy during the day-time because it is nocturnal.

Bird Song Guides for the backyard

Sometimes it's fun to just listen to backyard birds without worrying about all the other birds that are out there. There's a field guide for this also:









This is a sweet little compilation with all your familiar favorites!!
Blue Jays
Robins
Cardinals
Grackles
Crows
And a whole track of just woodpeckerss

Bird Song Guides

This is the audio bird guide you can find on amazon. It's thorough.

These are the songs and calls of more than 300 species of land and water birds recorded in the field by the Laboratory of Ornithology, Cornell University, under the direction of Dr.Peter Paul Kelogg and Dr. Arthur A. Allen in collaboration with Roger Tory Peterson. Original LP from 1975

Grackles: the birds that are commonly underlooked

Male Grackle displaying

Bird memories, recent sightings and observations

Today I was lucky because I caught a glimpse of an egret. I believe it was the Great White Egret but I'd like to call it a white heron. This is because it's neck was extended and the little white fluffy parts of it's tail feathers were hidden from view.

Yesterday I had to laugh because I heard a cat-bird. Nothing is funnier than listening to a cat bird call. Their song is pretty good too. What this reminds me of is how at the Nature center a loooooong time ago a naturalist was demonstrating how he could catch birds in a "birding net" mid their migratory routes. He had a fledgling and asked us how we knew it was a young bird.

There were many ways to answer his question, and I said "by it's cry". The naturalist said "No". The Gray cat-bird he was holding could not be identified as a fledgling by the noise it made. This is something to ponder and I'm sure a scientist out there somewhere is asking the same question. Is there a significant difference between an adult and a juvenile cat-bird cry?

close up

In this image here, one can notice the slight cast of yellow that grazes the bird.

Yellow-bellied Sapsucker

yellow in birds