Ornithamateurs - The Birding Thread

[jm1993]

12019752_1137493289597731_5164241214189445354_n by A J, on Flickr

Ruby Throated Hummingbird, Female

 

[Collar_N_Cuffs]

Awesome pics, all

Elle, does your pigeon have a name?
Silly question.. what do you feed it?

 

[La damnee elle la licorne]

 

[Collar_N_Cuffs]

Oh, I didn't keep it, I just got it to adult hood and then encouraged it on its birdy wAy. Sometimes it's hard not to want to keep somethings.

Pigeons and their ilk are quite easy to provide food for, because of pigeon fanciers needing food. In a real emergency they can have dog biscuits soaked and then sieved, but I use chick crumb, which up until recently I have usually had in. Then you can quite easily buy something called 'pigeon milk'. As they get older you can get them eating a commercial pigeon mix for ease, or other grains pigeons can eat. I put them out side, so that they aren't just eating from a bowl in a cage, and they start looking around.

I don't go looking for fallen birds, and myself would probably not bother, but once G brings it home convinced I can save it ( and it's not always a possibility at all) . If it were a rare bird I would call one of the specialist animal welfare charities I guess. I've not been in that position. ( thankfully)

When I was a kid, we incubated some eggs and hand reared a quail. I don't remember what happened to the rest of them, but we kept one. He was our pet his entire life, and he would happily sit on our heads or shoulders, we only put him in a cage at night. I'm sure it wasn't the best life be could have had as a bird, but I'm also sure that he contributed greatly to my love of birds

 

[pensivepoet]

I've tried to save a lot of birds.
Breaks my heart when it doesn't work.
Once tried with a hummingbird that couldn't fly. I think he finally died of a broken spirit.
Once when camping on Lake Superior, we founda sick herron. We drove it around to every vet that would see us.
Called universities.
Finally all we could do was take it to a protected place near the water and leave it.
More birds have broken my heart than women.

 

[La damnee elle la licorne]

 

[La damnee elle la licorne]

 

[Collar_N_Cuffs]

I am so excited by this, ( maybe you told me before ) because the lore is quail CANNOT be free range, it's the reason I never kept them.

Good thing we never asked anyone if it could be done or not
What is the supposed barrier?

 

[La damnee elle la licorne]

 

[Collar_N_Cuffs]

That they will always disappear, wander off.

An acquaintance of mine farms them, on small scale, and trying to keep welfare standards high is her biggest nightmare, because the males can be quite problematic together, and the rules about husbandry ( for reasons of hygiene) preclude lots of enrichment one might give on a small scale. We were inventing all kinds of crazy ways to keep them busy and happy within the guidelines.

Well just get one - they make a great pet

 

[AbsintheFather]

I heard a really cool story this morning on the radio about how some birds use spider silk as their 'duct tape' for building nests. I found it to share. Chack out this site too. It has a lot of other stories that look worth checking into

http://birdnote.org/show/spider-silk-duct-tape-bird-nests

http://birdnote.org/shows

 

[Collar_N_Cuffs]

I heard a really cool story this morning on the radio about how some birds use spider silk as their 'duct tape' for building nests. I found it to share. Chack out this site too. It has a lot of other stories that look worth checking into

http://birdnote.org/show/spider-silk-duct-tape-bird-nests

http://birdnote.org/shows

Awesome, as always Abs

 

[Collar_N_Cuffs]

I heard owls last night, wish I saw more of them!

 

[Collar_N_Cuffs]

 

[La damnee elle la licorne]

 

[La damnee elle la licorne]

 

[AbsintheFather]

I heard owls last night, wish I saw more of them!

Their was an owl that came to the pine trees near the farmhouse I used to own about 10 years ago. He came nearly every night for a year or more. He was a treat to listen to.

This morning there is a duck and her ducklings in my front garden. I asked G to get a photo, but ..the duck is barely visable, let alone her babies. . I hope she has come to eat some slugs . I have been considering buying a few call ducks for that.

We have two goose nests on our pond right now. One has six eggs, the other four, I believe. There may also be a duck nest, but it's hidden well on the wooded bank. The mallards are often there swimming, but I never see their nest.


One of last years' families

 

[La damnee elle la licorne]

 

[AbsintheFather]

From the web . . . . Pelican next in Texas

 

[desertslave]

I am so excited by this, ( maybe you told me before ) because the lore is quail CANNOT be free range, it's the reason I never kept them.

I really had to work on the context, there, because all of the quail I've seen are in the wild. Failure to parse. LOL

Coming home, just now, we saw a large hawk feasting on something in the weedy field just south. Fluff flying everywhere!

 

[Collar_N_Cuffs]

From the web . . . . Pelican next in Texas

Thank you Abs!!
I see pelicans constantly down at the coast, and have never seen a nest, nor thought about it for some reason One of my favourite birds

 

[AbsintheFather]

Thank you Abs!!
I see pelicans constantly down at the coast, and have never seen a nest, nor thought about it for some reason One of my favourite birds

I had seen you post about the pelicans and knew you would like this photo

I was doing some fishing down south over the winter and we fished where the pelicans were diving. Logic being that if the little bait fish were there for the pelicans, then that's where the big fish were going to be too. Sure enough I hooked and played several good sized tarpon. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to land any that morning.

 

[Collar_N_Cuffs]

I had seen you post about the pelicans and knew you would like this photo

I was doing some fishing down south over the winter and we fished where the pelicans were diving. Logic being that if the little bait fish were there for the pelicans, then that's where the big fish were going to be too. Sure enough I hooked and played several good sized tarpon. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to land any that morning.

It is fun to watch them fish
I found several colonies on different spits of land, I suppose they could have nests in the trees or bushes there, but I only every see then water side. Maybe I don't wake up early enough

 

[Collar_N_Cuffs]

A nesting pair of blue birds at a friend's house. They are certainly bringing me happiness

 

[Blue]

When I was about 10 or so I once climbed a huge 30-40m tall tree in the local park which always had birds chirping from within, and saw a birds nest up in the super high branches at the top. Oddly enough, one of these things stared down at me:

A little family of Puffins were apparently nesting in the tree, in almost the dead centre of England. No idea how they got there since they're coastal birds but I guess they just got lost when traversing somewhere. And that's the biggest role birds have played in my life thus far.