A Little Backyard Drama

I was sitting at the computer and checking my e-mail late this morning when I heard the loud and frantic calls of bluejays right outside the dining room window screaming "Danger" and "Hawk!" I grabbed my binoculars off the dining room table and crawled to the window (didn't want to frighten that hawk away if it was close to the house!) "Hmm, don't see see any hawks nearby," I sez to myself, "but those bluejays wouldn't make that much fuss for nothin'." So I grabbed my camera and headed downstairs for a more unobstructed view of the backyard and finally spotted the hawk. Can you see it?? (hint: look over towards the right side of the picture)
All the birds and critters love this wild thicket in my backyard, and it's a perfect spot for a hawk to perch and wait for some unsuspecting sparrow or junco to visit that tray feeder hanging nearby (far left side of picture).

Here's a closer zoom of the beautiful and patient Cooper's Hawk. It's a Project FeederWatch count day for me in the backyard and I'm always happy to be able to spot and count a Cooper's Hawk visiting my birdfeeders on FeederWatch day.

What a beautiful raptor. This photo through the double-pane glass patio door isn't as good as I would have liked, but when I was editing the photos, I was pleased to see that this bird's red eye showed up, so I could identify it as an adult.

Two weeks ago on FeederWatch count day, I counted 97 house sparrows, so this Cooper's Hawk is always welcome to help itself to as many house sparrows as possible!

A January Thaw!

It was beautiful and sunny in Minnesota today -- nice enough to cause puddles on my deck from the melting of snow and ice that's been accumulating for weeks.

And it's not just today that's nice......look at this forecast for the next week! By the looks of this forecast, maybe all the snow will be melted off my deck by the end of the weekend! Sure doesn't take much to make Minnesotans happy in the middle of winter does it?

And check out this great new pattern book I purchased today. One of my Etsy customers suggested I think about knitting some doggeh sweaters for my Etsy store, so I couldn't resist getting this book. Stay tuned for pictures of finished sweaters in a few weeks.......

A Sunday Trip to the Mississippi

The weather was pretty nice today, so we decided it would be a good day to take a drive down towards the Mississippi and see if we could spot some eagles and any other interesting birds. Here's the report of what we saw today. We drove up to Lake City and then headed south on Highway 61 (Minnesota's Gret River Road).
Fortunately, traffic wasn't too heavy this afternoon and there are several pull-outs along the highway where we can get some good looks at the river and birds. This is the Mississippi completely frozen over.

The hills on the other side of the river are Wisconsin and the Canadian Pacific railroad tracks run along both sides of the river.

There was one really large spot of open water right in front of one of the pull-outs, so I was able to get out and take some pictures. Here's an adult Bald Eagle perched in one of the trees along the river. There were lots of ducks swimming around in this open water too.

There were at least 10 eagles (both adults and sub-adults) flying around here, in addition to several other eagles we saw perched in trees and sitting on the edge of the ice.

It was fun watching the eagles swoop down close to the water over the ducks and the ducks disappearing under the water to stay out of the eagle's talons. I'm not sure whether the eagles really like to eat ducks or if they were just messin' with the ducks for some entertainment.

There were lots of different ducks out here, but they were quite a ways out there and it was just too cold for me to set up the spotting scope and spend much time trying to identify them. I could tell from the quacks that there were some mallards there. I also noticed some Common Mergansers and Common Goldeneyes.

While we were there a Canadian Pacific freight train came by pulling a bunch of tanker cars filled with what we thought was ethanol.

OK, time to get back in the truck to get warmed up and find some more birds. Our next stop was some open water down by Read's Landing where I spotted these swans. Holy crap, swans?

There were at least 8 of these swans in this area and I think they were Trumpeter Swans. What do you think?

We continued down to Wabasha where we crossed the bridge over to Wisconsin and headed south towards Alma and the open water at the lock & dam there. I was surprised to see swans in the open water at Alma too. Unfortunately, it was getting late in the afternoon and the sun was at the wrong angle for me to get any decent pictures. but I this these might be Tundra Swans. They were that grayish color similar to the juvenile Tundra Swans we saw on the Mississippi last November during their migration.

There were quite a few ducks in the water here too, but the light wasn't right for me to be able to identify any of them.

However, there were quite a few Bald Eagles in this area too. We saw at least 12 sitting on the ice at the edge of the open water in addition to a few soaring around.

But the coolest thing we saw here was when we started looking at the trees on the other side of the river and saw that there were Bald Eagles perched in a number of trees. I counted 11 Bald Eagles perched in this one tree!
This reminds me of eagle pictures I've seen from Alaska....we were so amazed to see so many Bald Eagles here in Minnesota and Wisconsin.

Bird Adaptations Class

Since the new year started and it's not as busy at work anymore, I have switched back to my 4-day-a-week schedule. It was sure nice to sleep in a little longer this morning! Plus I was able to add some time to my Master Naturalist volunteer hours log by participating as an assistant in the Bird Adaptations Class held for Rochester public school 3rd graders. I got to Quarry Hill Nature Center around 9:15 to meet with Carrie (the class leader) and find out what my duties would be with this class. Shortly before the class was due to start, Carrie got a phone call from the school saying there wouldn't be any students this morning as no arrangements for transport to Quarry Hill had been made with the bus company. Oh well, that's the way it goes sometimes.... However, as long as the mist net was up and one of the other naturalists at Quarry Hill was doing bird banding this morning, we decided to continue catching some birds. I was thankful that Carrie had time to work with me as I definitely need more experience getting birds out of the mist net.

We caught a really good variety of birds this morning. Here's a little White-Breasted Nuthatch I was able to release from the net myself. Experienced bird banders are probably cringing as they see the grip I have on this poor little nuthatch, and that's exactly why I really need to get more experience at the nets. I love working with the birds though because it's such an amazing experience to hold these tiny feathered creatures in my hand.

Here's Carrie holding the female Cardinal she retrieved from the net. Mrs. Cardinal was extremely verbal in voicing her displeasure while being removed from the net. Fortunately, Carrie's a very experienced bird bander and was able to avoid any abuse from Mrs. Cardinal's strong beak. Isn't she a beautiful bird though?

We also caught a male Hairy Woodpecker in the net. This is the first time I've ever been able to see one of these guys up close. His head feathers look a little ruffled and I'm not sure if that's from having the net removed from his head or just his annoyance at being held by Carrie.

And last of all, I decided to have a little fun with the stuff Great Horned Owl that was on display as part of the Bird Adaptations Class. Check out that wingspan! It looked really intimidating to me just standing there and holding it......can you imagine what a cottontail thinks as it sees this owl swooping down toward it?

Attention Great Horned Owls!

Welcome to Ruthie's Backyard Bunny Buffet!

Featuring delicious, fresh, corn-fed cottontail nightly from dusk 'til dawn!

Serv-Urself -- No Waiting!

Bring Your Friends -- All Owls Welcome!

(this post is just for fun and not intended to offend any bunny lovers!)

Resolution for the new year

I finally had a chance to get caught up on some of my blog reading today and was particularly interested in the post my friend Deb had concerning her philosophy on New Year's resolutions. This year Deb has resolved to do something joyful every day and for her that involves playing a musical instrument. As I was thinking about something joyful I could do every day, I decided that spending some time knitting was definitely a resolution I wouldn't have any trouble keeping. And in that spirit, here's an update on the sweater I first showed you in my December 26th post. As you can see, I made a major color revision, but I like it much better now. Both sleeves have been completed and about 6 inches of the body. Progress will be a bit slower now until I get to the colorwork on the yoke, but it will be some mindless knitting to work on during my daily commute. My goal will be to have this sweater completed in time to wear to the Sax-Zim Bog Winter Birding Festival in February.

This sweater pattern is called "Shades of Grey" and is from a Patons pattern book called Weekend Retreat, published in 1998. As you can see my sweater is in shades of brown, and even though this pattern book was published over 10 years ago, I still love all the sweaters in it and am looking forward to trying some of the other patterns someday.

Since so many of you (including myself) wondered why the Great Horned Owl only ate the head of that bunny in my backyard, I decided to consult with the best raptor experts I know: Susan K Williams and Dave Dorsey. (That's the coolest thing about blogging and Facebook -- I have almost immediate access to experts who have the answers to my most vexing bird and nature questions.) Anyway, according to my experts, when an owl kills prey that's too large for it to carry away, it will eat part of the prey first. And apparently owls will eat the head first in an effort to get at the chest cavity of the prey. If food supplies are plentiful, the owl will just eat what it wants and leave the rest behind. In leaner times, the owl will take the remaining prey and cache it for a future meal. Dave told me that when the Snowy Owl or Great Horned Owl at his Alaska Bird Treatment & Learning Center eat only the head they're eating too good and it's time to cut back a little. So now we know! Thanks Susan and Dave for your help!

Happy 2010!

Happy New Year Everyone. So far it's been a pretty typical Minnesota New Year's weekend. Here's what the thermometer told us at 8:00 this morning.Today we're not expecting to get above zero, but that's OK because we have plenty of warm clothes, lots of wood for the fireplace and we don't have to shovel cold! Plus the sun has been shining all day so at least it looks a bit warmer than it actually is outside! Sounds like the rest of the week isn't going to be quite as cold -- at least our daytime highs are predicted to be above zero!

Sophie's getting a lot of use from her sweater during these cold days. I can tell she doesn't mind wearing it outside because she's very cooperative when it's time to put it on her. She used to growl when I put her paws through the armholes, but now when I get her dressed, she actually lifts her paw for me to put the sweater on. Good Doggeh! (I'd knit her some socks too if I could figure out a way to keep them on her feet!)
Here's a picture of the one clever starling that's figured out how to get suet from the log feeder. The bird scoots up inside the cage and puts one foot on the cage and one foot on the log to eat its fill of suet. It's really awkward looking, but very effective for the starling......and so far, this is the only starling who's managed to do this.

WARNING: GRAPHIC PHOTO AHEAD!

This morning when I was out filling birdfeeders, I came across something very interesting in the backyard......something I haven't seen here for quite a few years......and something so exciting that I ran back to the house and yelled for Mr. Johnson to run and get me my camera really fast! "What could possibly be that exciting for her?" you're asking yourself. Well, here's what it was -- a decapitated rabbit!To the best of my knowledge, there's only 1 predator that would leave a decapitated rabbit and that's a Great-Horned Owl. I know there are GHOWs in the neighborhood even though we haven't heard them hooting lately. Several years ago, I found a number of decapitated rabbits in my backyard and at that time, I had to ask someone what was going on because I had no idea what animal would do that.

We have an overabundance of bunnies in the backyard again this winter, so hopefully the owl will remember and visit my backyard bunny buffet again soon. I only wish I had been able to see the owl with this bunny last night because this took place about 20 yards outside my back door!

More Backyard Birds

It was pretty chilly this morning (about 9 degrees when I got home from work at 10:45), but the wind wasn't blowing too hard and the sun was shining, so all in all, it was a pretty decent morning. (I can always tell when I've finally adjusted to winter when I'm happy about a daytime high in the 20's!)

So I had just gotten home and let Sophie out the back door and was getting ready to fill the birdfeeders when I had a "holy crap" bird moment: A robin in the backyard! Some of you may already know that I'm hyper aware of bird calls and when I heard that robin's chirp, I said to myself, "Holy crap, that's a robin!" and then I saw it fly away from one of the apple trees. I know some really hardy robins spend their winters in Minnesota, but I've never seen them in my backyard on December 29th! I ran in the house for the camera, but the robin was already gone. Oh well, as long as I had the camera out, I decided to take some more backyard bird pictures to add to the ones that I've been saving for the last couple weeks and I'll inundate you with bird photos today.

I have a bunch of little house finches hanging around again (no purple finches though). This old stump is a great birdfeeder in the wintertime.

The American Tree Sparrows started showing up in the backyard about 10 days ago. They're so cute that I had to take pictures of 2 different ones!

I really like their little two-colored beaks and watching them hop backwards when they're looking for seeds! I'm always amazed by such tough little birds like these guys and the juncos who call Minnesota their "southern" home for the winter!

Since the snow, I'm starting to see more of the goldfinches back at my birdfeeders again too. No Pine Siskens or Common Redpolls yet though.

Last Sunday morning I was amazed to see a Common Grackle at the backyard feeder.

And then I was even MORE amazed to see two! There was still one here yesterday, but haven't seen any today. I'm really hoping they stay around at least through the weekend so I can count them for my Project FeederWatch and one of my birding buddies has a chance to count them on his New Year's Big Day bird count.

About a week before Christmas when we still had some mild weather, there was a flock of Cedar Waxwings in the backyard cleaning off my crabapple trees one morning. I was lucky enough to capture this shot of a pretty little juvenile Cedar Waxwing who landed on the deck railing on her way to the birdbath. It looks as though the bird is looking at me through the window, but I think she's actually scoping out the birdbath on the deck just below her. Regardless, I loved the fact that I can see one of the little red "waxy" red feather tips on her wing. Cedar Waxwings are one of my favorite birds!

I think I posted this picture for Christmas, but you'll see it here again just because it's one of the best cardinal pictures I've ever taken. It really looks fabulous as my desktop wallpaper too! We've got bunches of cardinals in the backyard again this winter. Late in the afternoon, it's not unusual to see up to 15 total at the different birdfeeders around the house!

Silly Corvids.......Suet is for woodpeckers!

Hope you're all enjoying winter and seeing some good birds in your backyard too.

More Backyard Tracks

I've had these pictures in my camera since the 18th and I'm glad to finally get the chance to get them into a blog post. We had some snow predicted around this time and I wanted to make sure I got these photos before the snow covered them up because for me they held some special significance. Can you tell what these tracks in the snow are?? If it helps at all, here's a hint: they're on the south side of a large evergreen.....
If you said to your monitor, "that looks like spots where 2 deer laid down," well, then you are absolutely correct!

You probably remember that I posted some photos a few weeks ago (before the snow) of where deer had bedded down in the backyard and flattened the grass. Ever since it snowed and we were still seeing deer in the backyard, I've been on the lookout for any evidence that they're still bedding down and I finally found these 2 spots the morning of the 18th when I was out filling birdfeeders.

Mr. Johnson said I would be able to easily notice where deer had bedded down because the snow would be melted all the way to the ground from their body heat. (I tried finding out what the body temperature of a white-tailed deer is, but couldn't find that specific information. We're thinking that it's probably at least 100 degrees. If anyone knows for sure, please let me know in the "Comments" section, OK?)

So here's a close-up look at the first spot. It looks like she had a good nap and then probably had a stretch and a pee once she got up (just like me after a nap!)

Here's the other spot. Isn't it just so neat the way you can see the impressions from where she had her legs tucked in underneath her? And then her little hoofprints from when she got up and walked away?

The more I see of these deer, the more fascinated I become with them. I really love the fact that they're right in the backyard where I have the opportunity to watch their activities and habits so closely.

When I was out searching for more deer bedding spots (which I didn't find, BTW), I did come across this well-used bunny trail that goes from under another evergreen to the dense dogwood thicket in the backyard. All the little birdies and critters love this thicket and it provides really good protection from predators -- especially hawks.

Christmas Wrap-Up

I hope everyone had an enjoyable Christmas celebration with family and/or friends. We made the journey down to my parent's home through heavy snow yesterday morning (thank goodness for that AWD Chevy Tahoe!) and arrived without any problems although we saw more than 1 car in the ditch along the way. Brother Dave wasn't able to make it from St. Paul due to the more blizzard-y conditions north of here and the fact that he's also come down with a nasty cold (hope you feel better soon Dave!) We picked up Mr. Johnson's mom on our way and my sissy, her friend Harriet, and her daughters and grandson also made it, so we had a good group around the dinner table.

My mom and niece prepared a delicious dinner for us with enough for everyone to have seconds (good thing I don't eat like that every day!) My niece Kathy wasn't quite as hungry as the rest of us and decided to turn her leftover pile of mashed potatoes into "Spud" the mashed potato snowman -- complete with toothpick arms, green bean smile, carrot nose, mustard seed eyes and a jaunty pecan beret!

Here's Boris (one of my parent's indoor kitties) searching for his Christmas present.

Boris never did find that missing box of kitty treats, so he retreated to Mr. Johnson's lap for some consolation pets. (Mr. Johnson is not a huge fan of cats and somehow cats always seem to sense this and deliberately search him out!)

It's the little guys that always seem to get the most at Christmas isn't it? Here's the huge pile of presents for Ethan (my niece's little boy who was 2 in August). He got lots of cool dump trucks, cars, backhoes, tools and other stuff that makes lots of noise.......my sister may have to think about building a toyroom addition on her house before too much longer!

And after getting up early this morning, I got the chance to start a new sweater for myself! (This is a present I give to myself each Christmas after completing all my other Christmas projects.) Watch for future posts on this one.......

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all of you, my dear blogging friends and followers. I hope you enjoy a wonderful holiday with family and friends.



My Christmas projects are finished and I finally have a marginally faster internet speed, so I'm looking forward to getting back to blogging and visiting all the blogs I've missed for the past few weeks. See you soon!