backyard birds

I haven't heard our friend the Chuck Will's Widow lately. They're an evening birdwith a really interesting call. It took us a long time to figure out what it was since, being northerners, we'd never heard it before. We even wondered if it was a type of owl!! (silly people) We figured it out when I stumbled across a description that said they they call "incessantly" in 3 notes (chuck-wills-widow!). I thought, "Yup! That describes our little birdie friend to a T!" I highly recommend listening to this recording of their call.

Chuck will's widows are the largest of the nightjars. Since they tend to stay hidden at night though, I've only gotten one glimpse of one of the many around our complex. I have seen and heard their family relatives, the common nighthawk, many times though. I've seen them swooping for insects in floodlit areas, and heard them as they made their nasally little screech in the forest near our apartment.

We have a lot of owls around our place as well. A great horned owl hooted all night long for a few weeks, much to my friend Kathy's dismay when she visited. I saw the owl once perched on the apartment rooftops. I was so excited that I stood out there in the dark, with my groceries, for about 15 minutes looking around for anyone who was excited as I was. A barred owl made its prescence known very faintly around 6pm one day, and some species of owl screamed so loudly and angrily outside our window one night, that we bolted upright, hearts pounding, sure a murder was being committed. We'd like to think it was a barn owl, since they are harder to spot, but other owls are capable of screaming also.

Another bird I miss is the pileated woodpecker. We had quite a bold raucous pair every evening for a few months. I haven't seen or heard them in a while.

Watching birds (and the occasional racoon ;-) from our balcony has taught me a lot. I can now identify cardinals, pileated, downy and red-bellied woodpeckers, great crested flycatchers, the tiny northern parulas, catbirds, mockingbirds, red shouldered hawks and ruby throated hummingbirds by sight and sound. I never would have imagined bird watching would be so fun and relaxing. Does this mean I'm getting old? ;-}