Amateur Birdwatching

When the weather keeps me out of the garden, but I really need to get outside, it’s time to combine some amateur birdwatching and amateur photography.  It was a cold but sunny morning and I headed out to see what birds lived in our neighborhood.

 

In a stand of old trees at the end of the block I saw this male red-bellied woodpecker.  I heard his bird call first and then spotted him on some dead wood.

In this shot of the red-bellied woodpecker you can see the long beak for pecking on the wood, his red forehead, and his zebra back.  I love the very blue sky!

I was taking pictures of another red-bellied woodpecker down the block and realized when I got in the house that I had taken a picture of a female bird, with a gray forehead.

This is the only shot I was able to get of a downy woodpecker.  The red patch means that it is a male.  Yesterday I had a great shot of a downy woodpecker all focused and the battery on my camera died, so I had to venture out today and see what I could see.

I snapped a shot of this mourning dove all fluffed up to withstand the cold winds. It seems to be enjoying the sunny day.

This was as close as I got to getting a shot of the male cardinal, though I could hear the bird song.

The sparrows really love my bluebird house.  I have only had one pair of bluebirds in the yard and they were unsuccessful in raising their little birdies during a very hot summer.  I keep having to push the sparrows out each spring, to see if I can get bluebirds to come back.

I see the sparrows peeking out of the birdhouse every day now, especially when it is cold, windy, and snowy.

The berries are hanging on the Chicago lustre arrowwood viburnum shrub.  I wonder when they will be tasty enough to attract the attention of cedar waxwings or some other birds.

At the bottom of the viburnum I spotted this junco, I think.  The picture is not clear, since I was zooming in from the kitchen window, but the bird seems to have found a cozy place to sit in the sun.  Maybe the junco tried the berries or maybe they are too frozen yet.

Other birds seen in the neighborhood:  A big hawk flying high in the sky, a robin, and other small common birds.  I read an article yesterday that there is a bald eagle pair who have been nesting in the forest preserve a few miles from us the past two summers.