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Do you now anything about Northeastern birds?

  • Thread starter Ant
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Ant

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Do you now anything about Northeastern birds? update: pictures

lol, well my mom put a bird feeder out for the returning birds and I have a few questions about recent visitors. So far I have seen a female cardinal, a wood pecker (not sure on gender), and some sparrows. My question is, do cardinals find mates at this time of year, because my mom said there was a male too? Also how can you tell the gender of a woodpecker? ???
 
A male and female cardinal do seem to hang around with each other through the winter, but they have a very obvious courtship phase in the spring, with males singing in separate trees trying to draw in a female. I don't know if the same birds remain a pair the second year.

The most common woodpeckers where I live are Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers, which would be impossible to tell apart except that the Downy is much smaller. The males have some red on their head and the females don't. What I didn't know until I typed Downy into Wikipedia to check the spelling is that Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers aren't close relatives and are an example of convergent evolution. I worry about raising the dreaded e-word and coming back to find 25 pages of verbal sparring, but that surprised me because they seem so similar and I had assumed they're close relatives.
 
lol, I don't think evolution can cause a religious debate. I believe I have the downy one because it was small. Also thanks for the reply without making a dirty pun. ;)
 
I don't think evolution can cause a religious debate.

Famous last words. ;)

But I'll make you a deal: This thread is not to be turned in to an argument thread regarding religions, evolution, or anything else that doesn't regard directly to the OP's questions or related topic branches.

Go ahead. Make my day. :-))
 
ok, I saw a small gray bird with a white and black colored face. What is it? Also their is a grayish black bird about the same size with a black curved beak. Any ideas?
 
The small one with black & white face is probably a chickadee. You can generally hand-feed them. I don't know about the other one. Maybe a tufted titmouse? I hate to mention it, given what happened earlier with woodpecker, but that's a common bird around New England feeders and they're gray. But I don't remember them having a curved beak. You might want to go to the library and get a Peterson's guide book or search for an online bird identifier. If you find this interesting, you'll want to get a book.
 
lol, I hope they don't notice! The chickadee is right, but when I said gray, i meant it was black with some grayish tint mixed in.
 
  • #10
The most common woodpeckers where I live are Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers, which would be impossible to tell apart except that the Downy is much smaller. The males have some red on their head and the females don't.
Size can be a tough differentiating factor unless both are present - although here the size difference is quite significant. In relation to head size, the Hairy has a significantly longer bill than the Downy which can help ID's at a distance or when the other species is not around.
 
  • #11
I looked at pictures side to side and it also looks like the withe stripes go up the downy's body more then the hairy. Ok, so they is now a pair of downy woodpeckers here. I have also seen the male cardinal as well.
 
  • #12
Okay, I got some nice pictures of the woodpeckers.

The male
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Sorry about the glaze, I had the camera on the wrong setting but it is still nice.
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And the female, I think she is prettier then the male for some reason.
birds027.jpg
 
  • #13
I decided to put some seed closer to my window to get better pics. It seems to have worked. I have 3 blue jays here and some robins too but, some weird bird scared them all away. So no robin pics today.
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And what is this weird one? I never seen it before.
birds040.jpg
 
  • #14
The last photo is of a European Starling. Quite common in most of USA now after a supposed introduction via a Shakesperean play company many, many years ago. They are cavity nesters and quite aggressive feeders. They do not eat seeds with the exception of hulled sunflower or peanuts and corn. The will, however, make short work of your suet.
 
  • #15
oh, well the blue jays weren't afraid of them. Either way most of the birds at or feeder weren't eating the sunflower and corn. Also the flock of 7 I saw just now barely touched the suet. Sigh, so shakespear's plays brought an invasive species here? I knew classical plays were bad!
 
  • #16
The story I heard was that some organization decided to bring over examples of every animal mentioned in a Shakespeare play. That means we've been doubly blessed by Shakespeare.
 
  • #17
So did they bring over those house sparrows too? ugh, they need better animal laws involving bringing a non-native animal to a similar environment.
 
  • #18
It happened a long time ago and maybe we're lucky Shakespeare mentioned starlings and sparrows instead og lions and cobras. Or maybe he mentioned them too and the airheads also imported some of them, but they didn't survive.
 
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