Monday’s Ice Storm was followed by a Snow Storm yesterday afternoon and evening. But the Pine Warbler hung in there. It looked a bit cold and wet by late in the day yesterday, but today it looked great. With all this acclimatization maybe it will stay around for the Christmas Bird Count.
At 3 PM yesterday, it started to snow. I think you might be able to see the snow and the ice on the branches in this photo.
The ground-feeding juncos were not getting anything from our feeders. I took pity on them and tossed some thistle on the snow and ice. Amazingly, less than 30 minutes later one to two dozen Common Redpolls arrived. I had not seen this specie for over a week. How to these birds know?
How many times have I been able to get a Redpoll and Pine Warbler in the same photo? Never before.
Here are some more photos of the two species interacting, sometimes not necessarily peacefully. Plus one of a Chickadee sharing the feeder.
The warbler worked the thistle on the ground and some suet. By 4:40 PM it was looking wet and ragged.
But by this morning it was looking pretty good.
Here is a Redpoll and Junco from this morning to show the ice still on the trees.
This is what our yard looked like at 9 AM this morning.
As a final touch here is a red squirrel failing to jump up to the feeder. He made it about 10% of the time.
