May Chat

[Azerane]

White rabbit, white rabbit, white rabbit.

Today I drove an hour and a half (each way) to see a single bird. A single wild bird that I had no guarantee of seeing. To put it in perspective, this is a species that is maybe seen once per year in my entire state, and not in breeding plumage in May when they’re supposed to have left on migration for Central and North-East Asia by now.

This may not sound exciting to most people, but after a long drive, and scouring a beach for 2 hours, the site of this bird was extremely exhilarating. Got some great views and decent photos as it came closer with the incoming tide. The breeding plumage was just gorgeous, and this bird was fat as anything ready to migrate, lol.

So that’s the first day of May for me 😆 How’s your start to the month?

[RabbitPam]

That’s wonderful! I read a story just yesterday about a woman who loved watching a bird she saw on a walk, and years later she’d followed her growing passion to become a leading ornithologist.

Meanwhile, my May 1st is the first day both vaccine shots have reached full efficacy! It’s a good day.

[Ert000]

You are telling very nice things. I’m sitting at home. My biggest activity is looking through the window. 😂😂😂

Love for animals is the escape of human from human..

[DanaNM]

@Azerane what type of bird? That sounds like a great adventure 🙂

. . . The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.  

[LBJ10]

It isn’t unusual for birders to go a distance to see a particular type of bird. You have to go where the habitat is. 😉  I, too, am curious though. What was the bird Azerane?

[Azerane]

Ahh yes, sorry, lol. It was a Lesser Sand Plover, very pretty all coloured up for breeding season. While I somewhat regularly drive decent distances to go birding, I’m not really what others would refer to as a twitcher. Where when a particular or rare bird turns up, potentially hours or more away that you just pick up everything to go and see the bird. In most cases if I’m driving an hour to go birding, I’ve chosen a particular location like you said perhaps for a particular habitat type, but I’m planning ahead and I may not be after anything in particular I just record all the species I’m seeing. I guess what I’m saying is, it was unusual for me to pick up and go and see a reported bird on short notice just because it was new for me and not for any other reason. If that makes sense.

[DanaNM]

Aww I love plovers! I used to live right next to a snowy plover breeding area. Seeing a little chick on the beach was amazing. Such cute little cotton balls!

When I lived in New Zealand we went to Stewart Island, which has no invasive mammals (incl dogs or cats) on it, and it was amazing because there were just shore birds nesting on the beach all over the place. We saw an oyster catcher chick get blown down the beach and it’s parents had to run after it!

. . . The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.  

[prince dorian the bun]

Happy May everyone! Plovers are great and can be hard to catch (as in see not actually catch them). I am not an avid birder, but do like watching them.

Congrats on vaccine completion @RabbitPam… I get my second shot mid month and can’t wait.

My day has been spent dealing with Dorian having learned how to move the fencing and sneak into areas he shouldn’t, he managed it in one area and has taken his new found skill across the apartment. Being a little miscreant, he’s so proud of himself he keeps doing little binkies (he’s more of a flopper than a binkier usually). Lucky no real damage other than one plant leaf which didn’t seem disagree with him, but now I need to figure out how to reinforce my bun proofing.

[DanaNM]

I get my second shot mid-May too!

Haha Oh Dorian! What a rascal!

Cooper has taken to nibbling on the edges of the built in book shelf around our fire place, so I’m off to the hardware store tomorrow to get something to protect it. No amount of ivory soap seems to deter him!

. . . The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.  

[Hazel]

@RabbitPam : Good job! I’m getting my second shot next week.

[ALRyder]

Ah, I’m happy I’m not the only one with escaping bunny problems. Our new little one, Doodle, is so tiny she manages to escape from a particular hole in the extra-large dog kennel we’ve been using until I can bond her with our older rabbit, Snicker. I kept trying to block it but Doodle kept managing to get out about once a day. At least she’s easy to catch and usually more than happy to be caught because she doesn’t mind being held. We finally decided to switch Doodle’s cage with Snicker’s for now. They’ve been getting along right next to each other and kissing through the bars. Also, Snicker was more than happy to find that Doodle didn’t eat the little piece of bell pepper from dinner last night.

The escaping reminded me of when I took in some kittens. Their mom had disappeared and the owner couldn’t take care of them. So I volunteered. We kept the batch of them in the same kennel that Doodle was in, and one tiny kitten was small enough to escape from that same hole. I always knew when it was feeding time because he would escape and wander through the house screaming for me.

[prince dorian the bun]

@ALRyder little buns must be extra challenging! At least easy to scoop in your case. I have never heard of many bunnies liking to be picked up!

[LBJ10]

Plovers are fun! Even killdeer are fun to look at, although you don’t have to go far to see them around here. LOL I love this time of year because there are a lot of birds migrating through. I like seeing all of the warblers, for example. In fact, I saw a yellow-rumped warbler the other day.

Congrats to everyone on their vaccine completions. Such a good feeling!

[Susanne]

I’m not really into birding but trying to learn a little since I recently moved near a park. Have you used the birdNET app? You record the chirps and tells you what is the bird. Problem is I couldn’t even see them haha. I used it tonight and said I found a swanson’s thrush (I think I did see that one), Eastern Towhee, blue gray gnatcatcher and Great crested flycatcher. I’m skeptical of the last one since I can’t tell from the recording. Oh and I heard 2 barred owls briefly 🙂

Anyway cool app if you’re interested.

[DanaNM]

We also just started using a similar bird song app by sibley, I think it’s called “song sleuth”? It’s the same idea! You enter your location, record the song, and then it gives you options (it also includes frogs, squirrels, humans, hah). It helped us ID the bird that was outside our friend’s window and waking her up at day every day all spring! It was a Cassin’s King Bird LOL

I think it will really help us with our bird game, because we hear all these birds around our house but don’t see them half the time. Plus we are new to the east coast so everything is new to us!

. . . The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.  

[Susanne]

I’ll have to check out the other app as well, I like that other animals are options since I am pretty sure I’ve mistaken random animals for birds 🙂

Yes, it seems like ID’ing their calls is key, because even if you can see them (at least for me) they are too far away to tell for sure. I have binoculars too but the foliage is getting too thick now.

[DanaNM]

Yes I want to be better at call ID! Otherwise we just end up with lots of “LBB’s” (“Little brown birds”) hahah

. . . The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.  

[HipHopBunny]

Plovers are such gorgeous birds! <3

Things over here have been going well. 🙂 It’s so nice to see flowers and trees in bloom, with bees pollinating.

I’ve also been getting some Hummingbirds visiting my feeder. However, they are not the only ones who are making use of the food supply… Lately, there have been visits from some big yellow birds as well. I don’t’ know what they’re called, but they’re about three times the size of hummingbird, yellow, and have gray and black wings, if anyone knows what bird they might be. 🙂

I haven’t heard of that bird app before! I’ll have to try it out. 🙂

[DanaNM]

Not sure where you are HipHop, but in CA we used to see hooded orioles in the bottle brush trees with the humming birds. I think all orioles are nectar feeders? They are so pretty!

. . . The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.  

[Louiethebunny]

i can’t believe it’s already may 😀 louie’s gotcha day is coming up on the 10th… has it really been a year already??

[Azerane]

Yeah learning bird calls is extremely key to ID’ing species.  Some birds can only be differentiated by the call.

I can go on a walk and record 40 species but I might only see 30 of them, the rest will be calls only. It also makes it much easier to find different birds, because a different call will stand out. This actually happened to me yesterday, there’s a species I haven’t seen yet called a Black-chinned Honeyeater but I’ve listened to the call a lot over the years because I go birding in part of their range. We were out yesterday with family and I heard the call, it instantly stood out as different and after a moment I knew what it was, but I didn’t get to see it.

It takes time to learn but the more regularly you get out and look at birds the easier it gets. I don’t think there are any bird song ID apps in Australia but I could be wrong. There are photo ID apps though. I found USA birds really challenging, so many warblers and sparrows in non breeding plumage, so many little brown birds. I once spent hours pouring over bird books and photos to try and ID a bird I’d photographed. In the end I discovered the tiniest hint of red near the top of the head when I zoomed right in. Ruby-crowned Kinglet. Was very rewarding to have successfully ID’d it.

Anywayyyy… long bird ramble, sorry, lol.

[Azerane]

I forgot to add, Thursday was Dory’s (my Eclectus parrot) 5 year gotcha day! Hard to believe it’s been 5 years. I bought her a bunch of toys but haven’t put them in her cage yet.

[Susanne]

Aww congrats on 5 yrs! You’re right about the little brown birds, at least in my part of USA. I am thankful for the app as I don’t see myself being a super avid birder.. It’s really cool to know which ones are hanging out/hiding in the backyard! I agree, the more I get familiar with the most common ones, the easier it gets to pick out ones I haven’t learned and focus on a few at a time.

 

I got Elmer and Ruby a new blanket. They both approve, hard to see Ruby good but I’ve never seen her lay with her legs spread out like that 😆

 

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[LBJ10]

Azerane – I remember when you got Dory! Or found, should I say?

Yes… little brown birds. They are everywhere. What’s nice right now is that most are getting their breeding plumage right now. A lot of warblers are pretty easy to identify… if you can see them. Sparrows are much harder though.

Kinglets will migrate through and cedar waxwings. Of course, this is also a good time to see a lot of waterfowl and shorebirds. In fact, earlier today I saw coots, blue-winged teal, northern shovelers, and some least sandpipers.

Love the blanket Susanne!

[DanaNM]

I really want to see a cedar waxwing!! That’s one I’ve always seen in books and just think it looks so beautiful!

We biked to the beach over the weekend and saw loons for the first time as well as some types of sea ducks I need to look up.

. . . The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.  

[LBJ10]

Dana – There are supposed to be where I live during the winter, but I only ever see them passing through. They love berries, so you’ll often see flocks of them in eating dried up crabapples in late winter/early spring. Their chatter is sort of similar to starlings, but much higher pitched.

[Susanne]

I did see a Cedar Waxwing several years ago, it was randomly in an outdoor mall parking area eating berries. I hadn’t seen anything like it so I had to look it up. My mom said she saw one in her backyard recently, but only once.

That would be nice to live near the beach or water for even more diversity!

[Hazel]

All this bird talk makes me want to get into birds, we have plenty around here. 🙂

I’m getting my second Pfizer dose this morning, excited to get that over with.

[DanaNM]

Speaking of birds, do any of you have chickens???

I’ve always wanted them, and our landlord says we can put in a coop, but we would need some strong predator defenses out here so I’m not sure!

. . . The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.  

[Azerane]

Ruby is so cute stretched out on the blanket like that!

Hazel it’s never too late to get into birds, and you would surprise yourself with the number of species locally. You’re also very fortunate to have had your vaccination, I’m not eligible for one here yet, I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s November before I’m eligible.

I would love to have chickens, my brother has some. Most people here shut them away before sunset in a predator proof coop/pen and allow access to garden or larger pen (usually no roof) during the day. I know growing up our chickens had their night quarters, a large attached fully covered pen for daytime and then sometimes full access to the farmyard.

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