Since we have those fun Pileated Woodpeckers hanging around, I thought I’d look through the archives to see if I had any other “Bird Stories” to remember. I came across this one from back in November of 2013 when we were in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas. If you think those little brown house sparrows are boring – check it out!
11/26/2013 – For The Birds
Since the Rio Grande Valley is home to the World Birding Center, and renowned in birding circles for its wonderful birding opportunities, I was anticipating great things after we hung our bird feeders on our living room window awning shortly after we got settled in our winter campground. Bird seed in one, sunflower seeds in the other, suet feeder in the center. (Note to self – suet is not really the ideal medium in 80+ degree climates. If you try to make it work, make sure it isn’t hung over anything that could be damaged by melting suet. But I digress….)
Bird feeders hung. We were ready and waiting.
And waiting.
And waiting.
Finally, after about a month of nuttin’, a couple of house sparrows discovered the free lunch.
And once they spread the word, it wasn’t long before that bird feeder was emptied out.
“Wait, I think I see something!”
After that feeder got cleaned out, they moved to the sunflower seeds. Oh my, how they moved!
“I think I can still reach it from this hole!”
The changing of the guard.
Once they discovered this ready supply of food, it wasn’t long before we had quite a crowd vying for a perch!
And within a couple of days, they emptied that feeder too.
And that left the (mostly melted) suet.
Let me just say here that a suet feeder might be a bit outside of the “comfort zone” of house sparrows. They are pretty much used to gathering their meals off the ground, or from friendly neighborhood bird feeders. But they were determined to say the least!
“What do you think is the best way to approach this? This side seems a little tough.”
“I think it’s worth the effort. There’s some pretty good stuff in here!”
“Yo! I didn’t know my tail bent this way!”
And once they got the hang of it (get it, “hang of it” :)) the show just never stopped!
Even today, with winds gusting up to 30 miles an hour, they are still giving it their best shot!
Wheeeeeeee…..
They might not be the brightest colored birds around, but they certainly are a feisty crew – and they’ve been really fun to watch!
I think we better get those other feeders filled before we have a real battle!
