If you think about the size of a deer its amazing they can find enough to eat throughout the Winter to sustain themselves. We see them on occasion coming through the yard but never at the feeder.
Yeah once the ground is covered it's gotta get tough for them. I see em regularly standing on their back legs getting high up in the evergreens. Everything edible around here is trimmed to deer hight.
Could be hiding or cracking. I've mostly seen them do exactly what you describe, lodging a seed then cracking it to eat. And are usually upside down!!! Sent from my SM-S536DL using Tapatalk
Well MikeInMa since you've been seeing them lately you'll probably know better than me unless these pictures aren't good enough. Is this a female bluebird?
Was definitely kinda dark in the feeder for me to see its back. Breast is orange-ish and about in the same shape as your picture. I haven't saw the male yet so it's hard to be sure. I had thought id saw it before, that orange breast kinda sticks out but didn't really put much thought into it until i saw your post/pictures today. I just thought it was a different kind of junco.
To big to be a chickadee or junco & too small to be a robin and looks mad - yep, that's a bluebird Hard to say which it is doing since they do both. They will wedge nuts into the bark to hold it stable for cracking and they will wedge seeds into bark for later eating.
Some unconventional birds at the feeder this morning. This one must've had a cold foot or something. It stood there on one leg with the other tucked up tight to its body for awhile. Eventually went back to using it like normal. A couple deer in the background waiting their turn.
Some of the females/juveniles can be hard to identify. That bill looks more like a finch of some sort. But, I may be seeing a thicker bill than is really there too. Not being familiar with the birds that are generally in your area, it's hard to narrow down.
A little more looking and i think you might be right. I did another Google picture search and looked a little more. Here's one that looks similar. This is outta my bird book. Looks like you might be right about it being a juvenile. Maybe even a female juvenile?
Hers was an old gray hardcover and dont recall if National Geographic or not, although she did get national geographic so it probably was. I remember being a kid and her being an avid birdwatcher i would often look at the pictures in that book and your last pic is identical to the one in her book. Fond memories. Ill have to get a good pic of the white throats here.
My wife uses an app from Cornell that will identify bird calls and pictures pretty accurately. For instance, we have bluejays that will mimic a redtail hawk to try and keep other birds away. The app recognized it as a redtail but noted it could be another bird mimicking a redtail. As opposed to me making bird calls to try and fool the app only for it to tell us its a human. I've never seen it be wrong yet and it's free! Merlin Bird ID – Free, instant bird identification help and guide for thousands of birds – Identify the birds you see (allaboutbirds.org)
