Raptors!

I've seen several different raptors around these days. Along I-10 between FM 3180 and Hwy. 146, I regularly see Swainson's Hawk and Red-tailed Hawk. I occasionally see a Crested Caracara flying over. Around the house I see Red-shouldered Hawks that live around here. It shouldn't be too long before the Broad-winged Hawks begin to migrate south.

I saw three Ruby-throated Hummingbirds this morning at the house. I am going to put up my feeder pole in the morning and put up a couple of feeders. It will start to pick up really soon!

First Hummingbird of the Fall

This morning I looked out the window where I have my hummingbird feeder hanging and saw an adult male sitting on the fence about 15 ft. away from it. He came to the feeder and then took off. A few minutes later I looked out and saw what appeared to be a juvenile male sitting on the feeder. So, two individual hummers in a matter of minutes. Maybe it's getting time to set up my other feeders for all of the hummers I get in the fall.

Other interesting things going on around here include having up to twelve cardinals at my feeders at one time. There are several juveniles in that group. The males seem to have a bit of a testosterone surge still in them because any two adult males will have some kind of confrontation. The Eurasian Collared-doves seem to have had a successful breeding season. There are as many as eight of them around my feeders at a time. The bluebirds show up pretty regularly. I saw four of the juvenile bluebirds along with the male feeding from the fence in my yard yesterday. The swallows are migrating. I see them flying southwest most of the time. I've seen Barn, Tree and Cliff so far. Looks like I need to start getting out on Friday mornings for some birding since fall migration is up on us.

In case you're wondering how my Property Big Year is going, I'm at 126 for 2008. That's still 13 ahead of where I was this time in 2004, so I should have no trouble breaking that number. There are several birds that I missed in spring migration that I might get in the fall. I'll be posting my sightings from when I go out. I will probably have to wait until August 22 to start since I've got things going on today and next Friday.

I'm also going to expand the scope of what I write about on this blog. I'm going to include birds I see everywhere, not just on my property. I don't do a lot of birding in other places, but I get a fair amount in, even in the summer when I'm so busy. Hopefully with me blogging about all my bird sightings, I will update things a little more often.

More Tropical Storm Birds

There were a couple of other interesting bird sightings during the tropical storm on Tuesday. After the "eye" had passed over us, I went outside to check on a couple of things and to put some more seed out for the birds that were showing up in large numbers. I had ten cardinals, six Eurasian-collared Doves and four Blue Jays. The Carolina Chickadees were trying to figure out where their feeders went and never got the idea to head to the ground to pick up a seed. I put the feeders back out pretty quickly once I saw that. As I was putting the feeders back out, a flock of about 50 Tree Swallows flew over. They were flying against the wind so the entire flock was doing a zig-zag pattern as they flew. They flew right over my head, so I got great looks at them. I've seen a flock like that once, but it was in January several years ago. The other interesting sighting was the hundreds of Purple Martins that were soaring overhead. It sounded like I was standing next to a large colony with all of them calling. I tried counting at one point, but couldn't. I would estimate there were 150 to 250 martins at a time flying around.

I sure wish I could have gone down to Galveston to see if any pelagics had been pushed onshore by Edouard's winds. I guess I'll have to look at Texbirds and live vicariously through those who had the chance.

Tropical Storm Feeder Birds

Even with Tropical Storm Edouard, the birds were coming around the feeder. Cardinals were out there at first light this morning. I've heard chickadees and Blue Jays calling already.t I've recorded a 52.1 mph wind gust on my weather station. I took all my feeders down, but scattered sunflower seeds on the ground feeder for the birds. They don't seem too concerned about it. There are several White Ibis and a Little Blue Heron in the pasture behind the house taking advantage of the rain-soaked ground. The center of circulation has yet to pass us, so we'll see if we get more gusty winds and how the birds handle that. Just rain and a little wind so far, although the radar shows a little heavier stuff coming in soon.

Water on a Hot Summer Day

It's very dry around here right now. We received about 4 inches of rain from Hurricane Dolly, but it soaked up and didn't sit on top of the ground. Because of how dry it is, my birdbath is a great source of water for the birds. I've got a dripper rigged up on it. This morning when I looked out, there were five cardinals, two bluebirds, two Carolina Chickadees, one mockingbird and two Blue Jays sharing the water. The chickadees were clinging to the dripper hose and taking drinks from the water as it dripped out. It's fun to look out and see the birds taking drinks and bathing in the water.

Juvenile Bluebird

Yesterday I walked outside and one of the juvenile bluebirds was sitting on the kids' clubhouse. I ran inside and grabbed the camera. He sat there long enough for me to get a couple of shots of him. This was the best one. It's fun to watch the juvenile bluebirds come to my birdbath. There were three or four of the juveniles out there. This was the only one that stayed around to be photographed. Pretty often I'll see the adults come to the water as well. I love living where we get bluebirds!

Slow Summer Days

I've been outside quite a bit the past few days that I've had off and not much is moving around these days. The White Ibis still fly over with great regularity. I just wonder if they're having a population explosion because I don't recall ever seeing this many of them, except in the past couple of years. There are juveniles in the flocks now. A Downy Woodpecker is in our yard quite a bit. I've never seen them with regularity in the yard, so that's kind of fun. The young bluebirds are still hanging out in the yard. It seems that they are getting the hang of foraging and taking care of themselves. I see the male around pretty regularly. One of the most exciting things that happened is a Yellow-billed Cuckoo showed up in the trees to the west of our house on Saturday. I was sitting at our dining room table and saw him fly in and perch on a power line. There was no doubt what he was. I grabbed my binoculars just to get a good look at him.

I cleaned my birdbath and put some bricks in it that make the water depth about 1/2 inch. That should be better for the birds than the two rocks I had in there before which were kind of slick and didn't give the birds a good place to stand in the water. I'm really hoping the fall migrants find it and use it. The Baltimore Orioles used it quite a bit last year. Fall migration will be on us before we know it. I'm looking forward to it. I'm still three short of tying my 2004 number. I should be able to get it pretty easily. I'll be able to pick up a couple of the warblers that I didn't get in the spring as well as Baltimore Orioles. I didn't get one last year, but in years previous I have gotten an Olive-sided Flycatcher.

Also, it won't be long until the Ruby-throated Hummingbirds come through on their southward migration. It's usually the end of August that they start getting really thick around my feeders. I'll put one feeder out in a couple of weeks to see if any of them are hanging around here early. In case you haven't seen it, here is a video I took in 2006 of the hummingbirds at my feeders.