Any Bird Watchers Out There? Info/Pics

[drhu22]

Ive been keeping water out for birds in the back yard, and usually it's sparrows, magpies, ravens, and the occasional chickadee. I just had my first sighting of a Red-breasted Nuthatch (?). Im thinking the one that was drinking out back had three black stripes on the head though, and looked a little sleeker. Does that ring a bell with anyone? Anyways, I really enjoyed his visit (this is not my picture)...


If anyone is interested, feel free to post sightings, pictures, etc on this thread.

[^v^Tinda wolf^v^]

If it were simple to post I have some amazing pictures I took of a mother canary feeding her chicks. The nest was right off my campsight last trip I went on. After a couple days the chicks were out of the nest and racing around on the ground like a cheeta on cowcain 😁. It was cool to watch!

[drhu22]

Originally Posted by ^v^Tinda wolf^v^

If it were simple to post I have some amazing pictures I took of a mother canary feeding her chicks. The nest was right off my campsight last trip I went on. After a couple days the chicks were out of the nest and racing around on the ground like a cheeta on cowcain 😁. It was cool to watch!

That would be very neat to see... not sure why the pot vid though.
Re: "If it were simple to post", here is what I do...

resize to 1280x1024, go to postimage.com, upload photo, copy image address, go to AOL, reply with
[IMG]pasted image address you copied[/IMG] (fixed) included in your post.

[alacringa]

I have some amazing pictures I took of a mother canary feeding her chicks

Canary!? Was your camping trip to the Macronesian Islands, or was it an escape from someone's cage?

Here are a couple from this past summer:

Wilson's Snipe


Western Grebe

[Dead Moose]

It sure looks like a Woodcock. I grew up in SW Ontario and we hunted woodcock and that one sure looks like a woodcock but I doubt if we get them in Alberta

[drhu22]

Alacringa... what kind of birds? First is a snipe(Wilson's?) Im guessing


Edit: Woops, brain flatulence

[^v^Tinda wolf^v^]

Originally Posted by drhu22

That would be very neat to see... not sure why the pot vid though.
Re: "If it were simple to post", here is what I do...

resize to 1280x1024, go to postimage.com, upload photo, copy image address, go to AOL, reply with
[IMG]pasted image address you copied[/IMG] (fixed) included in your post.

The pot vid is my signature. Too much work for me unless it was used in the magazine then I would.

[drhu22]

Re: "The pot vid is my signature. Too much work for me unless it was used in the magazine then I would"

[^v^Tinda wolf^v^]

Originally Posted by drhu22

Re: "The pot vid is my signature. Too much work for me unless it was used in the magazine then I would"

Give me a second doc I’ll take a picture with my iPhone of my camera screen and post it to my avitar. Not sure how well it will work but I’ll try it Lolita

Funny it says upload of file failed. I tried dunno

[alacringa]

Originally Posted by Dead Moose

It sure looks like a Woodcock. I grew up in SW Ontario and we hunted woodcock and that one sure looks like a woodcock but I doubt if we get them in Alberta

You are correct on the last part. No Woodcock here. Woodcock are dumpier, warmer brown, much less streaky, and have bars across the top of the head.

[270person]

Originally Posted by alacringa

Canary!? Was your camping trip to the Macronesian Islands, or was it an escape from someone's cage?

Op is likely referring to the goldfinch. we always called them wild canaries.

[^v^Tinda wolf^v^]

Originally Posted by 270person

Op is likely referring to the goldfinch. we always called them wild canaries.

The bird is fluorescent yellow with a darker yellow head. I looked the bird up and it appeared to be a canary. The picture was taken at buffalo lake about seven weeks ago. I just tried again and still says upload of file failed lol. Cool pic though. Sorry

[alacringa]

Originally Posted by ^v^Tinda wolf^v^

The bird is fluorescent yellow with a darker yellow head. I looked the bird up and it appeared to be a canary. The picture was taken at buffalo lake about seven weeks ago. I just tried again and still says upload of file failed lol. Cool pic though. Sorry

That does sound like a female American Goldfinch.

[JareS]

Originally Posted by 270person

Op is likely referring to the goldfinch. we always called them wild canaries.

The American Goldfinch has black and white on its head and wings.

The most common bird here mistaken for a Canary is the Yellow Warbler

[Bushmaster]

Here's a Goldfinch.

[^v^Tinda wolf^v^]

Originally Posted by Bushmaster

Here's a Goldfinch.

That’s not the bird I took the picture of. This bird has a longer black beak and a very brisk darker yellow portion on the birds face that starts just below it’s eye and runs in a straight line to the back of its head. The chicks sure looked cute, all dark grey in colour. This bird is smaller than the cool little bird you have pictured.

[Red Bullets]

The 'canary' could have been a yellow warbler too.

[KegRiver]

The title asks if there are any bird watchers on site, there are. I am one of many here.




I also conduct bird watching outings for a friends guest ranch and I am a birdwatching pal. That is a volunteer organization that provides an internet platform for local bird watchers to offer help and advice to visitors or newcomers to their home region.

I also have tons of photos of local birds and animals, many of which I have posted here before.

I'll see if I can find something I haven't posted yet.

[Zip-in-Z]

Love to watch them, got a bunch of Birdee pics, too ... here's a few, more to follow.

D.


Yellow-bellied sapsucker hates my Owl!




So does this Downy male Woodpecker, drilled a hole in it!







Mr Osprey the Fish Eagle came over to eat its lunch on our pole a few times this summer






Tree Swallows nested again this year







Pileated Woodpecker
[/IMG]







Goldfinch’s visited often, gone now.

[drhu22]

Beautiful shots Zip-in-Z... thanks for posting those!

[drhu22]

Originally Posted by KegRiver

The title asks if there are any bird watchers on site, there are. I am one of many here.
I also conduct bird watching outings for a friends guest ranch and I am a birdwatching pal. That is a volunteer organization that provides an internet platform for local bird watchers to offer help and advice to visitors or newcomers to their home region.
I also have tons of photos of local birds and animals, many of which I have posted here before.
I'll see if I can find something I haven't posted yet.

Great to hear from an experienced birder... looking forward to your posts

[alacringa]

Originally Posted by JareS

The American Goldfinch has black and white on its head and wings.

Females lack black on the head.

Originally Posted by JareS

The most common bird here mistaken for a Canary is the Yellow Warbler

We have several warblers that are bright yellow (Yellow, Wilson's, Common Yellowthroat, etc.), but their body and (especially) bill structure in completely unlike a finch.

[Strix]

Anyone who calls a goldfinch or our yellow colored warblers a "wild canary" is not going to be familiar with body or bill structure. I have heard many people refer to our Yellow Warbler as a canary. Here is a photo I took of a female Yellow Warbler sitting on a "triple decker" nest. Every time a cowbird laid an egg in the warbler's nest she responded by building another nest on top of the first one. This determined little warbler finally succeeded in raising three chicks of her own on the third layer. Photo was taken in my yard a few years ago.

[GrouseHunter]

Hi I am new here and I do not have a picture to share, but I would like to share this with the bird watchers.

Last week I was walking around Lacombe Lake in St. Albert. While I was walking around the lake I noticed what I believed to be an Osprey hovering over the lake in circles around 200 feet up, he/she was obviously scoping it out so I stopped to watch what would happen. I knew there were fish in the lake because I had stopped in the past and asked people that were fishing there what they were fishing for? I was told gold fish, so I laughed to myself and went along my way thinking fishing for tiny gold fish that's funny!

Sure enough it was an Osprey and within 5 minutes of circling down it came really fast, it hit the water hard and to my amazement it took off with a gold fish in claws, not the type of gold fish that you see in an aquarium. this gold fish in my estimation was at least 5 lbs and it was gold in color because I could see the color perfectly!

Anyway a couple of days later I was doing my daily walk and the city was spraying the lake to kill these gold fish that are an invasive species because they want to stock trout in it. I looked in the lake and could not beleve all of the 5 lbs. + gold fish dying in the lake and flaoting to the surface.

If someone had of told me that I would witness an Osprey dive bombing a tiny lake in the city and see it fly away with a 5 lbs + fish I would never had believed them in a million years, yet it happened.

Only sad part of this story it that the Osprey will be gone now that all the fish are all dead. Fianlly a young boy caught a 16 lbs gold fish out of the lake about a week ago! Next time someone tells me they are fishing for gold fish in the city I am definately getting my fishing rod lol.

[KegRiver]

I feed birds all year and I have two sisters who are also into birds and who put out feed for them.

My photos are from everywhere I've been with my camera.

First, a Mountain Bluebird












Next is a Wilson's Warbler





A mixed flock of Blue and Snow Geese. Of course most hunters know they are colour phases of the same species







Arguably our most colourful bird. The only time I've seen a Baltimore Oriole in my yard.





Green Wing Teal, locals call them Butter Balls and they are quiet the challenge to hunt in the local sloughs.





I wonder how many know that in summer if you see a Waxwing in Alberta it's a Ceder Waxwing and in winter it's a Bohemian Waxwing? It has to do with their summer nesting grounds.

Bohemians are more colourful then Ceder Waxwing. I photographed this Bohemian in Manning at the SRD office, they show up there every winter to feed on the fruit of a Crab Apple tree that produces tons of very small fruit.



I'll see if I can find more photos I haven't posted here.

[KegRiver]

A few more, I've got hundreds more but I'll limit my contribution to leave space for others to post.


Pine Grosbeak on one of my feeders.





Spruce Grouse west of Notikewin


Ceder Waxing Hawk Hills community water supply reservoir.



Night Hawk at government gravel stockpile location. I suspect they nest here but I haven't found a nest there, yet.





I know that Geese nest at this location because; , , ,





Myrtle Warbler, in my sister's yard.





Sora Rail, common here but very hard to find.



Short Eared Owl on a neighbours fence line.



All the photos I post are under a creative commons license which means that anyone can download and use them for their own purposes but not for financial gain or publication in any form without my written permission.

[KegRiver]

Originally Posted by GrouseHunter

Hi I am new here and I do not have a picture to share, but I would like to share this with the bird watchers.

Last week I was walking around Lacombe Lake in St. Albert. While I was walking around the lake I noticed what I believed to be an Osprey hovering over the lake in circles around 200 feet up, he/she was obviously scoping it out so I stopped to watch what would happen. I knew there were fish in the lake because I had stopped in the past and asked people that were fishing there what they were fishing for? I was told gold fish, so I laughed to myself and went along my way thinking fishing for tiny gold fish that's funny!

Sure enough it was an Osprey and within 5 minutes of circling down it came really fast, it hit the water hard and to my amazement it took off with a gold fish in claws, not the type of gold fish that you see in an aquarium. this gold fish in my estimation was at least 5 lbs and it was gold in color because I could see the color perfectly!

Anyway a couple of days later I was doing my daily walk and the city was spraying the lake to kill these gold fish that are an invasive species because they want to stock trout in it. I looked in the lake and could not beleve all of the 5 lbs. + gold fish dying in the lake and flaoting to the surface.

If someone had of told me that I would witness an Osprey dive bombing a tiny lake in the city and see it fly away with a 5 lbs + fish I would never had believed them in a million years, yet it happened.

Only sad part of this story it that the Osprey will be gone now that all the fish are all dead. Fianlly a young boy caught a 16 lbs gold fish out of the lake about a week ago! Next time someone tells me they are fishing for gold fish in the city I am definately getting my fishing rod lol.

Great story. I've spent many ours watching Osprey hunt. It is amazing to watch. But no Goldfish for them here, just Trout.

[Red Bullets]

Excellent pics.

Here's an interesting note on one of the birds we love to hate.

Between 1892 and 1911 a bird watcher, Frank Farley, from the Red Deer & Lacombe area only saw 2 magpies in that area.

[German]

Excellent thread. I’ll definitely follow this one. One question, does anyone know a way do get rid of those pesky magpies. In the winter I get a dozen or so at my feeders and they put the run on the smaller birds.

[Okotok]

[QUOTE=KegRiver;3839730]A few more, I've got hundreds more but I'll limit my contribution to leave space for others to post.


Thanks for posting. Saw quite a few Baltimore Orioles out camping this year and wondered what they were.