Backyard Birding

On the recommendation of my pal, Braumeister, at the start of last  month I hung the contraption you see below from a branch on a red maple in our yard.  It is a bird feeder that you fill with peanuts.  Peanuts in the shell; raw and unsalted.   

I bought a big bag of nuts at a local bird food joint.  And while they're clearly labeled:  NOT FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION I suppose if I tried one I don't think it would kill me.  But you never know.  

It took a few days for the local birds to figure-out what it's for and now I'm restocking it almost twice a week.  

In any event the trail camera I installed to monitor who might like peanuts needed to be rearranged.  It needed to have its back to the sun so that subjects were appropriately lit.  It took a couple of tries to get the focal length correct.  Trim some branches and there was the opportunity cost of losing several days of potential photos as a consequence of an improperly-formatted SD card.  Mind you, the camera is old too.  Originally-deployed during COVID in 2020 it is quite frail and could fail catastrophically just about any time.  Nevertheless, being the cheap SOB that I am I intend to squeeze every last gigabyte of digital imagery out of this old Moultrie device as I can.

So, here's an update

Yours-truly wrangling and wrassling the gizmo one of countless times to get it situated 

Blue jay

White-breasted nuthatch

Red-breasted nuthatch

Pileated woodpecker

Downy woodpecker

Black-capped chickadee

And a hairy woodpecker

Altogether a nice collection of some of the year-round bird residents.  The migrators are beginning to arrive so it will be interesting to note if any of them like peanuts.

Stay-tuned....  

 

Update On The Peanut Gizmo

On the recommendation of my pal, Braumeister, at the start of this month I hung the contraption you see below from a branch on a red maple in our yard.  It is a bird feeder that you fill with peanuts.  Peanuts in the shell; raw, unsalted.   

I bought a big bag of nuts at a local bird food joint.  And while they're clearly labeled:  NOT FOR HUMAN CONSUMPTION I suppose if I tried one I don't think it would kill me.  But you never know.  

It took a few days for the local birds to figure-out what it's for and now I'm restocking it almost twice a week.  I figure before too long some other undesirable critter is going to discover it; so it's hung on a branch (likely limber-enough to NOT support a large mammal) from a carabiner using a length of army-surplus metal cable parachute rigging connected to the feeder.  It might just be raccoon-resistant.

These four photographs are a bit of an experiment.  It's an old trail camera on its last legs and the position is all wrong as it's aimed generally into the sun.  I'm thinking I'll have to reposition the cam 180 degrees and relocate the feeder - if the tree and its branches allow.

Photos are from this morning.  Chickadee, white-breasted nuthatch, blue jay and a downy woodpecker.

Stay-tuned....

 

Trail Camera Update

A funny thing happened to the trail camera supply chain this winter.  There wasn't a Moultrie trail camera to be had.  Nothing in stock locally.  Nothing on Amazon Prime.  Nada.  Was it a chip shortage?  A consequence of tariffs?  A shipping container that fell from a ship and is bobbing-around somewhere between China and a California port?  I have no clue.  What I know for sure is I've been wanting to acquire two more cams and I'm not used to being denied for 3 months.

Since they don't need to be cellular-equipped I know I should be able to snag them for under a $100 apiece; only they've been unavailable.  Other brands and models, yes.  Moultrie. no.  Pardon me for brand loyalty but it is what it is.  It's a boomer thing.

Anyway, after waiting for months, the Missus announced they were back on Amazon and that I should check-out the selection so she could include them on our order.  In short order they arrived - a couple of A-900 bundles including SD card and batteries - free shipping too. Set me back about $90 a camera.

I deployed the first, replacing the last of two A-25i models deployed April 24, 2020.  Its twin succumbed in 2025 and after five years of continuous use this cam was nearing the end of its useful life and will be held in reserve or maybe finish its tour of duty as the 2026 Oriole Cam this year.  We'll see.  Bottom line is I have one new camera still in the box and one old cam in reserve for the present.

Here are the last two pics from the old trail camera... 

Prepping and deploying the new camera...

Stay-tuned for some new photos before too long....

Active Scrape

Several weeks ago the Missus and I were out for a walk and found an active deer scrape near a trail camera.  Naturally, the camera was aimed away from the scrape.  It was a small matter to rotate the cam on the tree in the general direction of the scrape.  

This cam is located just south of the middle guard tower.  

Last weekend I uploaded some photos from that cam to review who was visiting.  I took the first pic a couple of days ago when out with the dog to provide a sense of orientation. Date and time stamps are visible.  

The scrape is the darker patch in the turf located in front of the dog and slightly to her left - centered near the bottom of the photo.

 

Threesome

Whitetail triplets are hardly common yet hardly unknown.  I've blogged about it here from time to time as a consequence of trail camera evidence of the same.

Type Fawn Triplets in the search tool in the upper left corner of the blog homepage to see what you find.  

And there was this short video clip records at the end of last month.....

   

The Oriole Cam

Backyard bird report.

It would appear that the redwing blackbirds have left for the season.  Same for the tree swallows.  Off to southern coastal states, Mexico and Central America.  Jill spotted bluebirds in the bird bath.  The robins continue picking-about in the yard.  Cardinals, kingbirds, hummers and goldfinches are everywhere, warblers are passing-thru. It's been the best year in memory for indigo buntings, purple finches and orchard orioles.  And with all the dead and dying ash on the landscape woodpeckers rule the world around here.

The orioles are still hanging-around but they're not long for this neighborhood and will be departing before too long.  And the porch camera will likely be redeployed somewhere in the woods.

Meanwhile, the grape jelly has been removed as it's been attracting bald-faced hornets; and those buggers are sociopaths.

Last batch of photos.....

 

   

Sunrise Bird

Sometimes one of the trail cameras delivers something with an artistic flair. 

 

It’s all unintentional and unstaged - pure chance.

 

Like this turkey walking towards ‘the light’….

 

Red Fox

Interesting to me is the anecdotal evidence of increasing fox sightings around these parts.....

 

The Oriole Ranch

The Oriole feeder has been deployed for a couple of weeks already and a spare trail camera strapped to a porch post has been offering-up a couple of batches of images worth sharing. 

Here's a double fistful of images illustrating the variety of species attracted to garden-variety concord grape jelly and a navel orange. It's not just orioles.

As time passes I'll post new (and old species) and any good action shots.....

Male Baltimore and orchard orioles

Female Baltimore oriole

Male house finch

Female Rose-breasted grosbeak

Male ruby-throated hummingbird

Female indigo bunting

Male indigo bunting

Orchard oriole and Downy woodpecker 

Coming in for a landing

Take-off!