Birds of Edmonds, WA. 2020

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Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
As I said earlier, both the male and female hairy woodpeckers were in the backyard Friday morning (8-21-2020). The female is on the left habitat stump and the male is on the right one.

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Male
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Female
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Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
Three hummers have been fighting over territorial rights to our backyards. The skirmishes start early in the morning when one perches on a tree two doors down and the others attack. They are finished around 9:30am.

Here is the view from my back deck.
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I tried to capture the action with my 7DII + 600L telephoto lens. It was overcast and would rain on occasion. I was really too far away to get good photos, but here is the best sequence of the bunch.

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Given the distance, I really don't know if it is worthwhile to try again
 
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Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
On the first day of September a juvie band-tailed pigeon, most likely from the flock that roosts nearby in a neighbor's tree, was looking for seeds beneath my seed feeders.

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Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
On 9-14-2020 I finally caught the flock of band-tailed pigeons that roost in a neighbor's tree foraging under my seed feeders. I suspect that one of the birds landed on the peanut feeder and tilted it so that peanuts spilled on the ground. I took these shots through the sliding glass door as the birds would immediately take flight as soon as I opened it.

This pigeon did not seemed interested in the suet in the ground feeder.

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Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
Saturday afternoon (9-26-2020) the flock of bushtits and a black-capped chickadee visited the suet feeder that hangs on the back shed.

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Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
Monday afternoon (9-28-2020) I set up on the back deck for the first time in ages. It got really warm.

A beautiful juvie light morph red-tailed hawk perched in a tree on the northern edge of Pine Ridge Park, then flew north over my house. It is about time for the winter visiting red-tails to arrive.

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Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
I saw two hummers fighting around one of my feeders, which probably explains why the fluid has been going down faster than usual. One looked like a mature male (lots of red on its head) while the other one looked like this bird, which showed up later in the afternoon.

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Reminds me of the song "All Along the Watchtower."

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Terry O

Well-Known Member
Great shots Bill. The Red-tailed Hawk shots are particularly impressive. What lens were you using? The 600?
 

Terry O

Well-Known Member
Btw we had a visitation of a hawk yesterday, but too far to identify with the naked eye. No doubt it was eyeing our raptor buffet 😄.
 

Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
Great shots Bill. The Red-tailed Hawk shots are particularly impressive. What lens were you using? The 600?
The hawk in the tree was taken with the 7DII + 600L telephoto. The flight shots were taken with the 1DxII + 100-400L telephoto zoom.
 

Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
Corvids, which include ravens, crows, and jays, are considered to be the smartest birds in the world. Friday afternoon (10-2-2020) two members of the family were hanging out in my backyard.

One evil minion of the Dark Lord

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and three of the Blues Brothers.

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I asked my son to spread some of the bird feeder nut mixture on the far railing of the deck to attract the Steller jays. Normally the jays are not shy about retrieving food in our presence while the crows are very cautious and wait until we are inside before they go for the handouts.

Much to my surprise, my son had no sooner turned his back and taken three steps from the railing when the crow swooped in and grabbed some nuts. Maybe it knew it had to act fast or the jays would get the nuts first.

The crow returned for seconds and thirds.

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It is October and the sun's rays are coming in at a much lower angle. I had to take the shots of the jay and the crow on the deck using negative exposure compensation to keep the low rays of the sun from over exposing the shots.

Update: The nuts were left out over night. Saturday morning one crow was retrieving some from the railing while another watched from the top of one of the habitat stumps. All the nuts were gone later in the afternoon.
 
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Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
The Ones That Got Away

#1:
I was sitting on the corner of the deck near the hummingbird feeders. A hummer swooped in to check me out. It was hovering so close to the back of my head that its wings raised quite the racket in my ears. I did not move as it was too close to photograph and I did not want to scare it off. It was a little more than an arm's length from me when it flew around to my side where I could see it. It flew in front of me to check out the 600L telephoto lens and tripod, then took off.

#2: A small raptor swooped low in and out of my neighbor's trees. I only saw its underside and could not identify it. It looked about the size of a sharp-shinned hawk or merlin. The crows and jays saw it too and flew in to investigate further. It never reappeared for me to get an ID or even a Sasquatch shot.
 

Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
I bought a nut mix in the hope Blues Brothers would visit the feeders. The nuts, which include walnuts and peanuts, proved too large to move down the feeder, so I smashed them up and refilled the feeder. The small birds do not appear to be interested in the nuts, so I will start leaving them out on the back deck for the crows and jays until the squirrels discover them.

Some shots taken Sunday (10-4-2020) through the sliding glass door of the dining room. Scouting my back deck from my neighbors' chimney

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Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
Picking up some of the nuts. The crow did not make frequent trips to the deck, so I don't think it was stashing the nuts like its Corvid cousins the jays.

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Bill Anderson

Super Moderator
Staff member
Monday afternoon (10-5-2020) one of the Blues Brothers got brave enough to pick up some nuts from the back deck. I had to shoot at -2 exposure compensation to keep from over exposing the shots.

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