Wood Thrush Notes: First Migrants Arrive in TN.

Sale Continues and GBBC

Our February sale continues through this Saturday the 18th on all bird feeding related products. Seed and feed, and all bird feeders and accessories are marked down. Get ready for the Great Backyard Bird Count which takes place Feb. 17-21. Take part in this fun activity where your backyard bird data is used by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Visit www.birdcount.org for more information.

First Neotropical Migrants Arrive in TN

We naturally think of migration happening in “spring” and “fall”, however, spring migration has already begun and just last Saturday some of the earliest songbirds arriving from Central and South America were spotted in a couple of locations in TN by avid birdwatchers. One location, the Duck River Unit of TN National Wildlife Refuge in Waverly, is a very popular and productive birdwatching location.

Neotropical means relating to or denoting a zoogeographical region comprising Central and South America, including the tropical southern part of Mexico and the Caribbean.

Tree swallows were spotted in both Chattanooga and Waverly. Tree swallows are a beautiful bird that we see with regularity using Bluebird boxes statewide. We have had customers report having Tree swallows in Bluebird boxes for many years now. Tree swallows are primarily insect consumers, but unlike other swallows, can eat plant foods which help them survive potential wintery weather of early spring. Tree swallows are often seen in open field areas away from trees but get their name from commonly nesting in tree cavities.

Tree Swallow

The Swallow family in general is among the earliest migrating birds to return to N. Am. every spring. This family consists of Purple Martins, Tree, Cliff, Rough-winged, and Barn swallows.

Spring migration for Ruby-throated hummingbirds, as usual, is closer to April. It is not uncommon for a few hummingbirds to be seen and reported the last week of March, but the vast majority of Ruby-throated hummingbirds will arrive in, or pass through, TN between the first of April and mid-May.

Coming soon. The Great Backyard Bird Count!

Once again the Great Backyard Bird Count is just a few weeks away, February 17 thru 20. The GBBC is a worldwide online citizen-science project, the first of its kind to collect data on wild birds and display results in near real time. It was launched in 1998 by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the National Audubon Society.

Our observations and data help scientists better understand global bird populations before one of their annual migrations.

Visit www.birdcount.org/about/ for more info on the count!

It’s fun and easy to participate and all you need is a birdfeeder or two. Information and instructions are available through the link provided. The 3 steps to participating are as follows:

Step 1 – Decide where you will watch birds. Easy enough. Your backyard works just fine.

Step 2 – Watch birds for 15 minutes or more, at least once over the four days, February 17-20, 2023.

Step 3 – Count all the birds you see or hear within your planned time/location and use the best tool for sharing your bird sightings: E-bird mobile, E-bird on a computer, or Merlin bird id app.

If you are a beginning bird admirer and new to the count, try using the Merlin Bird ID mobile app.

If you have participated in the count before, try eBird mobile app or enter your bird list on the eBird website www.ebird.org (desktop/laptop).

If you are participating as a group, see instructions for Group Counting.

We hope you will participate and present your data for a very worthy study.

Mark your calendars!

In celebration of National Bird Feeding Month and the GBBC all bird feeding products, from seed and suet, to feeders and feeder accessories, shepherd’s poles, hooks and hangers, and squirrel baffles will be on sale Feb. 11 thru Feb 18!

Wood Thrush Notes

Yellow Cardinal in TN

A backyard feeding station in Harriman, TN, in Roane County has quite an unusual visitor.  They have a yellow Cardinal visiting on a regular basis.  Yellow Northern Cardinals have been seen in at least 4 different states the last ten years but remain a rarity.  What causes a bird that is normally red to be yellow?  Basically, the red, orange, and yellow colors in birds’ feathers are created with carotenoid pigments derived from the foods they eat. In the male Northern Cardinal, yellow pigments from the diet apparently are converted to red by a specific enzyme. In a very rare genetic mutation, probably affecting fewer than one in a million cardinals, that enzyme is lacking, so the conversion to red doesn’t occur and the feathers are bright yellow instead. 

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Get Ready Now for Nesting Season

Just two weeks from now we will say hello to February, perhaps our coldest and potentially snowiest month.  But you can always count on a few days that warm to the 60’s and suddenly bird activity ramps up.  Some birds will begin singing and some, like the Carolina wren, may actually begin nest building. 

The Carolina wren, as you have probably seen, chooses some pretty odd locations to build a nest and often times in  places humans find annoying, like in a gas grill, or canoe, for example.  They often choose locations like covered porches, garages, and garden sheds.  Every spring we receive several calls from people who suddenly find themselves with a bird nest full of babies in a troublesome location.  If you have experienced this scenario get ahead of the game and block access to these locations as soon as possible. 

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And now is a very good time to review the nest box successes and failures you had last year and make adjustments if necessary.  If a nest box has been in the same location a couple of years with no activity go ahead and try a new location.  Move it soon.

Clean out old nests now if you haven’t already before birds begin new nest building.  Of course, birds will build on top of old nests but that can be a problem as insects like ants will find the old decaying nest attractive.  I have saved baby birds from certain death as the ants were beginning to eat them alive.

If you’ve never offered a Bluebird box consider putting one up in the month of February.  Even though the majority of Bluebirds won’t begin nesting until April they will do a lot of surveying of potential places to nest Feb. thru March.

National Bird feeding Month and the GBBC

February is National Bird Feeding Month and the Great Backyard Bird Count.  Many of you look forward to the count and sharing your data to help bird experts better understand the distribution and relative numbers of the different species of feeder birds. More info on the GBBC next week

Visit www.birdcount.org for more info on the GBBC.

Great Backyard Bird Count & Recent Bird Sightings

Coming Soon. The Great Backyard Bird Count.

Once again the Great Backyard Bird Count is just a few weeks away, February 18th thru 21st. The GBBC is a worldwide online citizen-science project, the first of its kind, to collect data on wild birds and display results in near real time. It was launched in 1998 by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the National Audubon Society.

Our observations and data help scientists better understand global bird populations before one of their annual migrations.

Visit www.birdcount.org/about/ for more info on the count!

It’s fun and easy to participate and all you need is a birdfeeder or two. Information and instructions are available through the link provided. The 3 steps to participating are as follows:

Step 1 – Decide where you will watch birds. Easy enough. Your backyard works just fine.

Step 2 – Watch birds for 15 minutes or more, at least once over the four days, February 18-21, 2022.

Step 3 – Count all the birds you see or hear within your planned time/location and use the best tool for sharing your bird sightings:

If you are a beginning bird admirer and new to the count, try using the Merlin Bird ID app.

If you have participated in the count before, try eBird Mobile app or enter your bird list on the eBird website www.ebird.org (desktop/laptop).

If you are participating as a group, see instructions for Group Counting.

We hope you will participate and present your data for a very worthy study.

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Recent Bird Sightings of Interest

Locally, a number of customers have seen Pine Warbler at suet feeders during the recent snow falls. They are one of the few warblers to be seen here in winter. Others sometimes seen at feeders include Orange-crowned and Yellow-rumped warblers.

Pine Warbler

Orange-crowned Warbler

Yellow-rumped Warbler

Elsewhere in the state, bird sightings of particular interest include a Painted Bunting being seen consistently in Knoxville. Painted bunting, like Indigo bunting, usually migrate back to Central and South America in the fall and return in the spring.

Great Horned owls on Nest

You may not know that Great horned owls begin nesting as early as mid-January and February in southern parts of the U.S. Clutch size of GH owls is between 1 and 4 eggs and it takes 30-37 days to incubate. The fledgling period takes roughly 42 days. Pine trees are often a favorite choice of nesting location as are cavities in live trees, dead snags, deserted buildings, cliff ledges, and man-made platforms. I once witnessed a GH owl nest on a cliff-ledge along the Harpeth River.

The video below is taken from a live stream of a GH owl in Savannah Georgia. Click here to link to the live stream.