Today's bird report

I decided to keep a list of the birds I viewed from the deck of the Aerie today. I would casually not what appeared outside and occasionally take five or ten minutes outside to listen here is the list I compiled. I've not given the number of individuals because some of them were coming and going all day (chickadees, mourning doves, and juncoes in particular).

Turkey Vulture
Sharp-shinned Hawk
Great Blue Heron
Mourning Dove
Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
Downy Woodpecker
Hairy Woodpecker
Northern Flicker
Blue Jay
American Crow
Black-capped Chickadee
Red-breasted Nuthatch
White-breasted Nuthatch
American Robin
Evening Grosbeak
Song Sparrow
Purple Finch
Dark-eyed Junco
Northern Cardinal
Red-winged Blackbird

Yep, 20 species in all and they were all spotted between 7 AM and 12:30. That's when the sharp-shinned first showed up. He took a white-breasted nuthatch to lunch. It was pretty cool to watch. The hawk appeared on one side of the clearing while there were small birds (juncos, chickadees and the one nuthatch) on the other side near the feeders. The hawk sat and watched while the little guys did their thing to my seed supply. Then the nuthatch got careless and turned his back on the hawk to worry a sunflower seed on the top of a stump. Faster than you could say "Jackie Robinson" that hawk was across the clearing and had the nuthatch pinned with it's very pointed talons against the side of the stump. He held it fro a bit and then flew off into the woods clutching his lunch. I thought that would be the end of my viewing, but in a moment the sharpie dropped to a log on the forest floor well within my sight and began to rip the little nuthatch to pieces. I could see the feathers being scattered to the breeze. I watched for over a quarter hour while the sharp-shin finished his meal. I got distracted and when I looked back, he was gone. He showed up again, however, at 2:30 and at 5 PM brought a friend--a second sharpie just a bit different in size but nowhere near large enough to be a Cooper's Hawk which looks almost exactly the same. I don't think any more small birds were taken during the second and third visits, but I may be wrong. Things would quiet down right quick when the hawk appeared. Soon after he left, things were back to the normal hustle and bustle, however.

Oh, and two deer walked through the edge of the yard around 2:30, too. Normally there are three that travel together. I call them Mom and the twins since that's what I got on film early last summer and what I saw at that time on the edge of the yard. I'm wondering if Mom kicked the kids out while she's gone off to have this year's fawn(s). With the grasses starting to turn green again, it's about time for her to drop if she got knocked up last fall. She didn't look preggers when I saw her last about two weeks ago and she was still with the twins at that time. But they were slinking through the woods and not so much out in the open so I could have missed the signs. [UPDATE: Saturday morning at 6:30 AM Mom and the Twins were standing in the lawn trying to coax the grass to grow faster. No new fawns and she's not carrying any half-barrels on either side of her like they were panniers packed with new life. Oh well.]