Backyard Feeders

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Happiness sees no bounds on the first sight
Is That your wings that flutter or is it my heart
How I wish I could fly like you
And see the world from above
With Birds-eye view ;​

It was that time of the day when darkness slowly vanishes and dawn breaks slowly spreading its light. With the moon still visible I could hear crickets chirping. When I heard the first chirp of a bird I peeped into the backyard to get my first glimpse on the bird feeder that was hung recently. I saw a red cardinal sitting on the wooden pole chirping and inviting its friends. Somehow, this bird feeder couldn’t support big birds like Cardinals. The grains that were scattered on the lawn attracted Northern Red cardinals, Blue Jays, black Grackle birds while bird feeder attracted small birds like sparrows, black capped Chikadees, White-breasted Nuthatches.


Whenever these small birds feed of the bird feeders, grains got scattered and this invites the big birds like BlueJays and Cardinals. It is a lovely sight to watch so many different type of birds in our backyard. Nuthatches usually land like a bat on the pole and just extend their neck to get their food. I even had a rare sight of two cardinals feeding each other, or maybe they were expressing their love. Usually the birds visit until 9 in the morning and then come back only in the afternoon for a while. Among these loud chirps, a small squirrel will try to get its hands on the corn that gets scattered while a brown bunny would be eating some leafy stuff.


We also have a humming bird feeder and in fear of the big birds, humming bird feeder was put a little closer to the kitchen window. These little angels just the size of our pinky are beautiful to watch when they drink off the nectar with their long beaks. They make numerous trips to the feeder by just dipping their beaks. When one bird was sitting comfortably and drinking the nectar, other one was flapping(70 times per sec - Courtesy:Google) its wings and still floating in air while trying to get a drink.


Wonder how so many birds live in unison naturally. They are different species but just come to find it’s food. Now that the weather is changing, slowly they would migrate south and backyard would be bare (or filled with snow to attract deer). When they migrate, I would miss seeing them but for some reason there is no attachment either towards the birds or towards feeding them. They might come back next year and may not be the same birds too but it's easy to let them go when they migrate. How I wish I was not attached to other things in life and it would be as easy as watching a bird fly away when the time comes.


Nobody knows when the last goodbye would be with these backyard feeders ...

 

Satchi the pictures I uploaded are not of great quality but you can still see the birds. Hummingbird is so tiny, Chickadee is peeping from behind the feeder and Red Cardinal is so blurry .... time to get additional lens either for my iPhone or for my camera.

 

@Viswamitra, Viswa Sir, thank you so much for your blessings and a wonderful FB. It would have been a nice sight to watch Orion playing/chasing birds. It was like a therapy for me to watch those birds. Wish I had done this earlier.

 

@gitasharma thanks for your nice FB. Yes those early morning moments are blissful and helps me to start the day peacefully.

 

Nice @Viswamitra sir. We once had a squirrel hide under our couch and couldn't get him out inspite of trying to lure him with his fav food and had to get experienced professionals to get him out. They got trained dogs that sniffed and chased the squirrel out and it turned out to be a very costly (350$) affair. So I was under the impression that dogs will try to chase birds and birds would sneak in to get their grains. Imagination ran wild. But it's nice to hear Orion trying to communicate to birds and play with them. It's surprising that nothing in nature fights except when it comes to food and survival.