Birding Notes

A gorgeous male Rose-breasted Grosbeak has been visiting the feeders in our front yard today. It is vividly colored, with black and white patterned wings, back and tail, an all-black head, large pinkish-ivory bill, and a deep rose-red bib that goes down the white breast in a perfect soft V-shape.

When not on the feeders, it’s been staying nearby in the new-green leaves of the water oaks and pecans. Among the sound of water dripping from the trees and shrubs, drenched from showers last night and this morning, the Grosbeak’s squeaking call – like the sound of a tennis shoe on a hardwood floor – gives away his location.

When he is on a feeder, he fends off just about all other birds. A male Cardinal approached once. The big Grosbeak partially flared its wings, parted its huge beak, and lunged toward the Cardinal, which flew away without further dispute.

The trees are all fast leafing out, and it seems to be raining green as the grass grows and more and more leaves open on oaks, sweet gums, and pecans, and even small dusty rose and green leaves are opening on some of the white oaks. Meanwhile, the white sprays of dogwoods still lace thickly through the woods. They’ve been especially pretty this spring.

Many other birds also were singing in and after the rain, including a White-eyed Vireo in shrubs near the edge of the woods, and a Red-eyed Vireo in trees around the house and in the woods, both recent spring arrivals. I first heard the chick-perchickoree-chick calls of two White-eyed Vireos in the old field just outside our subdivision last Thursday, April 9, and first heard and saw a Red-eyed Vireo here in our yard the following day, April 10. It sang its musical four-part song a little more slowly and deliberately than usual, but very clearly, as it moved through the trees. I think it had been singing in the woods for a couple of days, but this was the first time it came close enough for me to see its slim shape, white eye-stripe and dark cap.

Blue-gray Gnatcatchers, Ruby-crowned Kinglets, White-throated Sparrows, Brown-headed Nuthatches, Carolina Wrens, Cardinals, Titmice, Chickadees, Chipping Sparrows, Phoebes, a Mockingbird, Towhee, Downy Woodpecker, and Red-bellied Woodpeckers sang or called. A Red-shouldered Hawk cried from beyond the trees in the east, its usual territory. A Robin’s song was the first thing I heard this morning when I awoke, against the background music of the rain, and it’s continued to sing enthusiastically all day.

Maybe the most surprising sounds I heard this morning were the zhrreeee calls and chirpy squabbling of about a dozen Pine Siskins that are still here. Along with Goldfinches, several Siskins came to both feeders and chirped and sang high up in the trees.

A male Blue Grosbeak that flew by from the edge of the woods and disappeared around the corner of the house was another surprise, and it was gone so quickly, I could barely trust my eyes, especially in the gray, murky light. But its very dark blue coloring with rusty wings, together with its overall shape and size looked pretty familiar.

So the busiest time of the spring migration season seems to have arrived. Almost every day right now brings something new.

Late this morning, under a sunny blue sky, two Barn Swallows sailed and swooped and dipped over a big grassy yard in our neighborhood – the first ones I’ve seen this season. I was walking near the house with the large porch where they usually nest each year, and wondering if they were back yet, when I heard a dry twittering, and there they were, right above me.

With steel-blue back, red-orange breast and long forked tail, they are striking in appearance, but the main reason I’m always happy to see them again is that their sweeping, fast, exuberant flight is so much fun just to stand and watch. I wonder if a Barn Swallow’s flight might be the equivalent of a Wood Thrush’s song – its most eloquent expression of being.

A pair of Eastern Bluebirds are feeding babies in the bluebird house at the edge of our yard. Both male and female go in and out steadily with food. Twice this morning as I watched, the female flew in with food, and the male flew right behind her and perched on top of the nest box, waiting while she was inside. When she came out, he flew away with her. At other times, he went in with food by himself.

Once they flew to the box together, she ducked directly into the entrance and he perched on top to wait for her, and waited – and waited. When she had not come out after what seemed like a very long time, he finally moved toward the front of the box, leaned over and peered down toward the entrance, then stepped off and fluttered in front of the entrance hole for a couple of seconds before flying away to a nearby branch. I also got tired of waiting for her to emerge and looked away – so I don’t know when she finally came out.

Meanwhile, there’s an Eastern Phoebe sitting in a nest in the curve of the gutter pipe just below the roof, pretty high up from the ground. Her sooty-dark head can just be seen rising above the nest. If I stand and look up at her for more than a few seconds, she flies out of the nest and away. The male sings frequently, and hunts from low branches all around that area.

And this afternoon a Carolina Chickadee fluttered around the entrance to a ceramic nest we’ve hung from a branch of a pecan tree in the front yard – so maybe a pair will adopt it, too. We’re not sure this nest will work very well, because it’s designed to be hung, and seems to swing a lot in the wind, but we’ll see.

It’s been a beautiful spring weekend, with blue skies, off and on some clouds, and lots of birdsong, especially early in the mornings. I still have not seen or heard many returning migrants, but both yesterday and this morning a Blue-headed Vireo sang from the edge of the woods. It stayed frustratingly just a little too far away to see among the new-green leaves of water oaks and sweet gums.

Blue-gray Gnatcatchers called speee all around the yard, and a Northern Parula continued to sing its buzzy song nearby in the woods. At least three or four Chipping Sparrows trilled from perches in shrubs and trees, and their songs are among my favorites right now. Although a Chipping Sparrow’s song is usually described as a monotone trill, it seems to me that no two of them sing quite alike at this time of year. Some are looser, some faster, some lighter in quality, more airy, some more forceful, some even almost musical.

Phoebe, Cardinal, Carolina Wren, Titmouse, Chickadee, Eastern Towhee, Chipping Sparrow, White-throated Sparrow, Brown Thrasher, Robin and Ruby-crowned Kinglet have been among the other morning singers, with the calls of Red-bellied Woodpecker, Downy Woodpecker, Brown-headed Nuthatch, and the cries of a pair of Red-shouldered Hawks. The Mockingbirds in our yard sing now and then, but not much yet.

And we still have a good many winter residents. One female Yellow-bellied Sapsucker continued to tap into the pecan trees around the front yard all day yesterday and today. Yellow-rumped Warblers creep through the branches of the trees, gleaning insects from the catkins and small new leaves, calling check! and now and then singing a few loose, pretty notes. Dark-eyed Juncos feed quietly around the bushes, only making soft jingles when they are startled into flying up into a tree.

About a dozen Cedar Waxwings still come back to visit the Savannah hollies for red berries every day. They must not eat many of them at a time. They move in silently, one at a time, materializing like shadows above me, lurking in the branches for a while, then whispering tzeeeeee calls before moving into the hollies.

This morning when I stepped onto the back deck – into a sunny, colorful, very windy day – I heard a familiar low chirping, looked around – and there were six little brown-streaked Pine Siskins in the bare branches of the white oak that hang over the deck, in the same area where a feeder hung until about two weeks ago. They chirped in a quiet but insistent way, and one by one came a little closer and closer toward me, as if hoping that I was bringing food again.

I was surprised to see them. I thought they had all gone – though one morning last week I did hear the zhrreeee calls of several in the pines again, so apparently a few are still around. These six chirped and studied me for three or four minutes, then abruptly flew away, disappearing into the wind and the trees.

After a lot of rain the past few days, it felt good to see blue sky and sunshine again. The woods are turning green with new young leaves and white sprays of dogwoods. A Northern Parula continues to sing in the trees around the house, and there are the wheezy spees! of Blue-gray Gnatcatchers and the songs of Phoebe, Chipping Sparrow, Cardinal, Carolina Wren, Chickadee, Titmouse, Towhee, White-throated Sparrow and Ruby-crowned Kinglet.

Two Louisiana Waterthrushes now sing in different directions along the creek, in their usual territories, though it’s been hard to hear them the past few days through the rain, wind, and the rushing of very high water in the creek.

A Red-tailed Hawk circled and soared in the strong wind. A female Yellow-bellied Sapsucker, with a pure white throat and crimson crown, tapped on the trunks of the pecans. A Dark-eyed Junco flew up from the grass into a tree, with a high, thin jingle of notes. And a Brown-headed Cowbird perched in the very top of a pecan tree and sang.

In the crook of a gutter pipe just below the roof and beside the chimney, there’s a nest that looks as if it’s made of mud and something green. It’s neatly shaped and rather large, and we think it may be the nest of a pair of Phoebes. A Phoebe often wakes us in the morning lately, singing from just outside our windows, and there’s a pair that hunts all around the yard, close to the house.

This morning a Northern Parula sang from the branches of a large sweet gum tree on the edge of our back yard. A small, round, colorful bird with a blue-gray head, greenish back, and a blurry coral band across a yellow breast and throat, the Parula sings a crisp, buzzy song that rises to a crescendo and quickly drops down.

In this same tree yesterday morning – where new-green leaves are beginning to open – an even smaller, slim and trim Blue-gray Gnatcatcher, with a long, often upturned tail, called its wheezy spee! spee! hello.

Today the weather is gray and cool, with more rain in the forecast. From down near the creek I can hear the brightly slurred song of a Louisiana Waterthrush. I first heard it sing last Friday, March 27, early in the evening during a break in the rain.

With a pale green haze of new leaves spreading through the woods, the lacy white sprays of lots of dogwoods in bloom, and the arrival of these first returning migrants, it’s beginning to really feel like Spring.

The Pine Siskins have gone. The little brown-streaked birds with ravenous appetites that first appeared in our yard in mid January, swarming the finch feeder and keeping it busy every day since then, have finally left for their homes in the far north and west.

Their absence was the first thing I noticed when I stepped outside this morning, into a cool, gray, drizzly day. The chirping and zhrrreeeeee calls that had become a familiar part of the sounds around the house could not be heard. The pine tops where they had gathered stood empty and quiet.

We had taken down the finch feeder a couple of days ago, on Sunday, deciding that it was time to let them go. All Sunday afternoon and most of Monday several Siskins continued to hang around in the branches over where the feeder had been, sometimes fluttering in the air, as if it must be there somewhere, or they were certain it would return. Even yesterday there still were a dozen or two Siskins in the pines, a few visiting the bird baths and feeders out front, and many chirping and calling.

But this morning – Siskin silence.

Yesterday morning I was working outside for a while and noticed the pines getting louder and louder with a congregation of Pine Siskins. Three came to one of the bird baths for a drink, and three or four more perched in some low limbs of an oak, but many more of them seemed to be gathering in the pines. Their chirping and zhrrreeeee calls got louder and louder, until their voices drowned out just about everything else around. But it was not unpleasant – in fact, I’m going to miss that unusual, twanging zhrrreeeee when they’re gone, and probably all the sense of lively activity that they bring, too.

The morning was cool, and the sky had clouded over, turning the daylight gray and pensive. All of a sudden, a flock of Pine Siskins – maybe two or three dozen – rushed out of the pine tops and away, flying north, almost as if they were flinging themselves into the wind – and the pines fell silent. For some reason, the rest of the yard suddenly became quiet, too. The titmice and chickadees deserted the feeders, a Red-bellied Woodpecker flew away, two Juncos, several Robins and a Chipping Sparrow darted up from the ground and into the shrubs.

Was that it? I wondered. Had the Pine Siskins just left us for their homes in the north? No. A few minutes later, there was one lone Pine Siskin singing from the very top of a pecan tree, and not long after that several more returned to flutter all over the feeder in the back yard again. So their morning flight was nothing unusual, I guess. But at the time, it seemed like a preview of their departure, bound to come before too long.