Saturday, April 10, 2010

Random Report of my Recent Birding

I went out Wednesday afternoon to refill the feeders and found this young male House Finch inside the feeder!  He must have been determined to get those seeds.  I have seen them stick their heads under the hopper slot before, but never all the way in.  I was able to open the lid/roof and he flew off, none the worse for wear.

Wild Turkeys have been seen at Avimor and Shadow Valley Golf Course right along Highway 55.  I had heard this from an Avimor resident and I saw a report on eBird of another Idaho birder seeing them at the golf course.  On our way to take Kyle to Cub Scouts, our 7 year old, Anne shouted from the back of the minivan that she saw a huge bird with a red face.  She said it looked like a miniature ostrich.  I couldn't believe I missed it.  On the way back home an hour later we stopped where she had seen them. I got out and looked down into the ravine.  Nothin' but some old cars that had crashed down there decades ago.  As we started to pull back out onto the highway, there were two Wild Turkeys right in front of us on the highway shoulder.  Fun!

While my son was at his Cub Scout meeting, Jessica and I took the girls down to the Eagle River District area for a walk along the Boise River.  There is an Osprey platform nest there and it appears they are sitting on eggs.  We watched one Osprey eating a fish in a tall cottonwood tree.  After a few minutes, it flew with the fish in its talons to the nest platform, handed it off to the other Osprey which then flew to the eating tree to finish off the fish, while the original Osprey took its turn on the eggs.  Pretty cool to see this kind of mate-sharing behavior and it provided a good lesson for the girls about spouses unselfishly helping one another.

Avimor's Great Horned Owl:  We saw our first owlet eyes and beak Thursday morning.  We still don't have a count of how many chicks hatched, but we'll keep watching!  Update:  I had good views of the nest this afternoon and only one chick was sitting upright and may have been the only owlet to make it.

1 comment:

  1. Sounds like you had fun. I also had a great day birding this morning and afternoon. Yard work between.

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