Bird Number 78 and other Bird News

Spurred on by my brother, a sort-of-retired farmer and much better birder than me, we started keeping a bird “yard list” in 2008.  A "yard list" for us isn’t just our yard, it’s the property we live on - which includes our actual yard (duh!), a beaver swamp, old farm pasture and hayfields as well as woods. Starting on January 1st, we write down the first sighting of each kind of bird we see on the property.  Or, in some cases... that we hear (like the Great-horned Owl, number 19 this year and Barred Owl, number 54).  As long as we can identify it for certain, it goes on the list.  We simply jot each species down in a small spiral notebook, with the date and location.  

Which brings us to my title... bird number 78, which was..... a Great Egret!  (making its first appearance since we started keeping our lists).  This is not the first time we’ve seen one here though, as I marked in my “Sibley Guide to Birds” that we saw one in the swamp on April 19th, 2007.  So, all in all, pretty uncommon for us.  And I missed it, because I wasn't home!  My husband was mowing the lawn (which is also pretty uncommon since I usually do the mowing) and happened to notice it.  He said such a large, white bird really stood out in the swamp.  So he ran to get the binoculars and camera.  These are the photos he took:

Great Egrets have black legs and yellow bills.

Sorry about the electric line cutting thru the photo!

I was sorry to have missed it, but glad to know it stopped by for a little while. 

I enjoy seeing each bird that makes our list, from the regulars at the bird feeders to those we only see occasionally.  Bald Eagles have been making the list the last few years.  I can still remember how excited I was when I saw the first one in the swamp in 2010.  Sightings of them have become more frequent, and this year I actually saw 3 (flying together) at one time. 

Bald Eagle sitting above the heron nest, February 10, 2013

And in other bird news, it’s been a pretty exciting day today.  The activity at the grape jelly feeder is picking up.  Besides the Orioles and Rose-breasted Grosbeaks, which are constantly lined up waiting their turn (and sometimes fighting over whose turn it is!), today I saw a Blue Jay eat from it, too.  I didn’t manage to get a photo while it was on the feeder but this is from right afterward. 

You can also see a male Baltimore Oriole and Rose-breasted Grosbeak waiting in the wings.

Then later this afternoon, I saw a male Downy Woodpecker having a meal at the Hummingbird feeder.  He looked like he was quite enjoying it!

Drinking thru the bee guard is a little hard!

You can see how the Downy uses his specially designed feet to cling onto the bee guard.

After that, I saw a heron catch a rather large fish and eat it! That's something I certainly don't see everyday, even though I watch the herons in our swamp often.  

Besides the heron with its prize fish, can you see the Painted Turtle in this photo?

It's fun to keep a list of the birds we see.... and it helps me learn to identify more of them.