A usual day at my feeder includes a pair of cardinals who feed at dawn and dusk, usually poking about on the ground for fallen seeds.
The chickadees are particularly friendly and fly around your head as you fill the feeder. If you're lucky (and very, very quiet), you can even get one to feed from your hand.
But today I caught a glimpse of a
Northern Shrike, a fairly unusual sighting.
He was not there to feed on the seeds but as a predatory songbird, he was looking for fresh meat! All the little birds scrammed pretty quickly.
Luckily for the other birds (but not for him), he left empty handed.
A usual day at my feeder includes a pair of cardinals who feed at dawn and dusk, usually poking about on the ground for fallen seeds.
The chickadees are particularly friendly and fly around your head as you fill the feeder. If you're lucky (and very, very quiet), you can even get one to feed from your hand.
But today I caught a glimpse of a Northern Shrike, a fairly unusual sighting.
He was not there to feed on the seeds but as a predatory songbird, he was looking for fresh meat! All the little birds scrammed pretty quickly.
Luckily for the other birds (but not for him), he left empty handed.
Thanks for enlightening me about the shrike...a meat-eater that small? I'll have to watch for it, haven't seen one yet as far as I know but birdwatching is one of my activities from inside the house during our infernal winters.
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