The feeder went back up last week and five beeeeeautiful red Cardinal males and four gorgeous tan & red females found their way back and began to entertain me. Aaaahhhh.... I love watching them! And there was a bright blue Blue Jay and a Red Bellied Woodpecker (who's red, incidentall, is actually found on the head - go figure) and a couple of others I haven't identified as yet. My bird feeder was hoppin' and my delight in my feather'd friends growin'!
Today as I strolled into the breakfast nook with it's windows overlooking our deck I was beseiged - YES! BESEIGED! - by a deck, tree & feeder entirely overrun by Starlings. I kid you not - it was like a scene from Hitchcock's "The Birds." Eeewwwww!!! It was awful!! They scattered but not too far. Here you can see the sitting in the trees just across the small ravine, queing up for their next attack.
Look hard - all those little dots in the trees are the Starlings - and this is just one shot of the trees behind my house! I wish a had a way to scare off the Starlings that wouldn't affect my darlings!!
And while we are at it, let's talk about the squirrels. Last winter there were so many hickory nuts on my deck you could not walk across it. I am totally serious. To try to cross the deck without sweeping or kicking clear a path would mean twisting an ankle at the very least. This year the tree is practically barren and so is my porch. The squirrels are not coming to feast. I miss the little guy that had a special spot on the railing where he dropped all the hickory shells. It was messy but he was so cute.
If you look hard you can see three litte black hickory nuts. Not much for a squirrel family to live on....
So, thanks to my old friend Shelli, I found out about providing dried corn on the cob for the squirrels. This one has been hanging in my tree for several days now and I have not seen a single squirrel. Krissy says it has teeth marks and that the peanut butter she spread on it is gone, but I am not sure that means a squirrel came a'callin' - probably just another Starling trick!
