I was outside with the dog a few minutes ago and got pictures of a Red-winged Blackbird; this is either a female or a juvenile male. It was perched on the fence next door, ruffling it's feathers and singing away:



Off topic again ... Our Bo is 3 years old today; he got a new toy for his birthday and I cooked him a hamburger patty for lunch; he will get a tiny taste of vanilla ice cream this evening. He's one very spoiled and happy pup!

@plantladylin Happy Birthday to Bo, who is also a beautiful "pup."

Lin, for both the singing blackbird and for Bo!

Nice turtle photos, Lin. Poor thing looks as though she had a nasty accident at some point, with the damage to her shell. I hope at least a few of her young manage to survive. We watched turtles laying eggs in the Seychelles one holiday - it was wonderful.

Thanks everyone!

Mika, It does look like that turtle had an accident at some point; I wondered if perhaps at one time it had been someones pet and maybe was dropped. I think their shells are fairly hard so it must have been subjected to a very hard hit to have it crack like that.

Poor turtle.

Back to talking turkey We have wild turkeys here but that is another one one that I have yet to get a photo of.

I quit putting seed out 4 years ago when the girls came back here to live. It was too expensive. With the school year winding down and Hayly graduating and possibly going off on her own or at least not needing as much from us financially, I bought some safflower seed and put it out yesterday. Did not take the little birds long at all to find it.

Carolina Chickadee and a Downy Woodpecker


White-breasted Nuthatch


This female cardinal was not sure about the tray feeder.


Crow grabbing a hunk of suet!


Brown Thrasher


The Juncos will all be gone any any day now.

Great photos, Claudia, I'm glad the birds were so quick to revisit your garden. Hope the female cardinal decides that your restaurant is worthy of her regular patronage!

Neat platform feeder. If I had one of those, it would be full of squirrels!

Claudia, what a great variety of birds, nice photos! I love, love, love those cute little Chickadees, wish they visited here in the south. Great shot of that Crow being so greedy!

Lin, those are sweet pictures of your obviously spoilt doggy, Bo! Love them.

And great birdie pictures too!

Today I watched this Caroline Wren going in and out of the propane tank enclosure when I realize - every year we find a nest in there... now I know who's nesting in there.



There's a nest under there.

Looks like Bo is having a good time. Great pics of Bo; Plato sends Bo a Congratulations on his special day!

Bo is gorgeous and looks as though he's having a whale of a time. And as for Plato... This website -- both plant envy and pet envy!

Great bird pics everyone

I'm not sure we have the gold eyed grackles here. I think they all have black eyes. I will have to pay more attention to them when they come to feed.

No grackles in our area. But we do have cowbirds, which are not nice. They hijack other birds' nests.

Christine, I love Carolina Wrens, they have the prettiest song and the juveniles are such cuties. Wrens sure do choose unusual places to build their nests but that propane tank is the most unusual I've ever seen! She must feel like it's a safe place from predators but I hope a snake doesn't find the nest. My sister used to have Carolina Wrens build nest in hanging baskets off her back porch and we had them build nests in the purple martin houses in our backyard; one year a black snake slithered up the tall pole and got to the nests.

GrammaChar, Those Brown-headed Cowbirds must be everywhere now. I never, ever saw a single one until about ten years ago and now they are prolific and appear in large flocks Pretty birds but being brood parasites unfortunately depletes the survival rate of other birds. Love the Chickadee!

Northern Cardinal


Blue Jay's have been jostling with each other for the feeder this morning

Great bird shots, Lin!!!! That is a popular feeder!

Christine, loved the picture of the Carolina wren. We have them here in AR and one year they built a nest in the wreath on the front door and another they built a nest in our grill. I spent one enjoyable afternoon watching them fledge. The grill was on our deck next to our bedroom door and I could watch them unobserved.

LOL, it's the only feeder I currently have out; all others are packed for our upcoming move. The one seed feeder and one suet feeder have been quite busy. I've been packing stuff in the kitchen today and got these pictures a few minutes ago through the window.

Male Red-bellied Woodpecker:

Female Red-bellied: