2022 Catching up: Part 5...misc. birds of the fall and early winter...

 

The female Rose-breasted Grosbeak.  I think they are very pretty, even though they lack the colorful flashy appearance of their mates.  This one hung around looking for some berries to eat.

Always happy to have a nice photo of a Bald Eagle!  He sat on that pole and posed very nicely for us.  They don't tend to be easily spooked by much.  I think they know they are "king of the hill".

From the biggest to a much smaller bird....The Chickadee, one of my favorites.

Migrating warblers are always fun to watch for spring and fall.  This Yellow-Rumped Warbler was having a bath in the creek.  He may have been around all summer, but I didn't see him much.

The Carolina Wren looking for something....

.....or we can try it upside down!

The small birds all love this ball feeder.....chickadees, titmice, nuthatches visit regularly.

A beautiful Northern Flicker stopped by one day!  Love the yellow tail.

The Titmouse loves peanuts, so I try to keep him supplied.

So does the Blue Jay!  He fills his mouth with as many as he can get in....4-6 before flying away.

A Red-shouldered Hawk stopped by for a look.  These were after the snow and cold came.

Blue Jay filling up

The Chickadee being cute

A Ruby-Crowned Kinglet that shows up every winter.  He was hunting for something in the azalea bush.  Below he even showed me his "ruby" which he doesn't flash very often.

One of my many Cardinal pairs.  I can sometimes see 6-7 males all at the same time, with their females nearby as well.  Easier to count the bright red males.

Nice to see him when his mouth isn't full of peanuts!  Always looks pretty against the snow.

Those are most of my regulars except the woodpeckers.  I can count on Downys, Hairys and Red-bellied pretty much on a daily basis.

2022 Catching up: Part 4...The neighborhood hawk...

No one likes a hawk hanging around their feeders all the time, but we have a Cooper's Hawk that spent many days in late fall checking out my feeders.  He poses so nicely on my fence, that I get a lot of nice portraits of him.

My favorite photo of him.  He is watching a gray squirrel who didn't bother to run away.  Looks rather wistful, but they seem to ignore each other.
 

2022 Catching up: Part 3...Robins and Waxwing eating the holly...

 One of my favorite sets of photos from 2022.  When we got our first snow in November, the Robins and a Cedar Waxwing came to strip the holly tree of its berries.  Made for such lovely photos with the snow and the holly and the birds!

I love Cedar Waxwings and don't get to see them very often.  I was thrilled even if it was only one.

2022 Catching up: Part 2 Vultures

 One evening in October, a group of about 20 Turkey Vultures were circling our neighborhood and decided to land in the trees.  I had a lot of fun taking their portraits.

A face only a mother can love?

An immature one.

I had never had an opportunity to study them this close before!

Not pretty birds, but certainly interesting.

2022 Catching up: Part 1: Snakey Point

 2022 was such a great year for seeing birds and I have decided that I want to catch up my blog with the sightings from Sept.-Dec.  This will be repetitious for anyone who also looks at my photos on Facebook.  Back in Sept. and again in October we went to a place called Snakey Point.  A large marsh/pond it attracts many migrating birds.  I found a lot of egrets and some shorebirds.

I'm not good at identifying shorebirds, so I won't try.

There were two types of egrets....the Great Egret and the Snowy Egret which is smaller.

A Snowy Egret

Snowy Egrets

The lotus blooms were huge and the snowy egrets liked wandering around among them.

When we went back in October the egrets were still there....about 48 of them!  Mostly Great Egrets this time.  I had never seen so many at one time before.

A Great Egret

I call these two "the old married couple"

It was an amazing place and I plan to go back to this place for spring migration.  How many waders depends on whether there has been a lot of rain or not and how shallow the water is.  The first day there were quite a few, the second trip there were only a couple.

I think this is a Tennessee Warbler that we saw as we were leaving.