The weather is getting better and birds are returning to Vermont. It was time to change the camera settings out of eclipse mode and back into bird mode. I went out to photograph woodpeckers, but ran into some other birds as well.

Eclipse Photos taken in Hinesburg, VT on 4/8/24. Some of totality photos are taken at higher exposures to highlight the corona. I do wonder what our ancestors thought when they had this happen. It's easy to see how this would cause awe as well as concern.

A year round resident of Vermont's forests. Brown Creepers are a small and energetic birds that hunt along the trunks of trees for insects and their like. Unlike a nuthatch, which hunts moving down a tree, the brown creeper flies to near the base of each tree and hunts climbing up the tree. Each species hunting style gives them a unique viewing angle and therefore each can spot bugs hiding in different crevices. A handsome mottled brown back gives brown creepers great camouflage, especially when on a tree trunk and sitting still. Their curved bill has evolved to allow quick and easy extraction of insects from craggy bark. The brown creeper is the friend of the trees, doing their part to keep pest species under control.

A surprise visitor to our pear tree yesterday (2/13/2024). It was a Bohemian Waxwing! So exciting to see this species for the first time. Very similar to a Cedar Waxwing but slightly larger, with a buff colored belly, brown under-tail coverts (under-rump) and colorful pattern on his primaries (wing feathers). He was alone and hung out for over an hour eating the small pear fruit that did not mature. Not sure what the alcohol content is of these shriveled fruit. Fortunately waxwings are used to this type of diet. A golden-crowned kinglet made a quick visit as well to see what the waxwing was doing.

Feb '24 Followed a report about bluebirds being seen and was able to locate some that were wintering nearby. These bluebirds were flying back and forth from a group of hardwood to sumac bushes nearby. Sometimes one would fly to the ground, like they would do in the summer when they are chasing insects. Near the location of the bluebirds a different pair of birds flew down onto the road. They turned out to be a pair of Crossbills, gathering grit. These birds, usually seen in larger flocks, sometimes come this far south in the deep winter. There cross shaped bills developed to efficiently extract seeds from conifer tree cones, their main food source.

Feb '24

Feb '24

Jan '24 This male Goldeneye seemed very attached to this female, so I had convinced myself that it must be a female Goldeneye. Wrong! He was hanging out with a female Lesser Scaup. I later read that Goldeneye females winter further south then the males. I haven't seen a female Goldeneye on Lake Champlain, yet.

Jan '24