Terre Pruitt's Blog » Birds

Assessing the Threat Level – Can it eat us?

terrepruitt — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 23:54:01 +0000

Our cat is an indoor cat. She does not go outside. I honestly feel that cats should be able to go outside. There are so many fun things for cats to experience; butterflies, grass, fences, frogs, lizards, flowers, etc. They do belong outside, able to roam, but unfortunately there are also many dangers. In addition to believing that cats really should be allowed to go outside, I feel that people must take responsibility for their pet(s) and that can come with a heavy price tag. Neither my heart nor my wallet could afford having to fix my cat if one of those outside dangers were to injure her. In our neighborhood we have raccoons, opossums, dogs, cats, cars, and sometimes the worst danger of all . . . other people. Not everyone is an animal lover or they might not enjoy a kitty fertilizing their garden — understandable. So we keep out-r cat inside. She, like a lot of indoor animals, LOVES to sit by any open door or window. She can sit there for hours. She stares and sniffs, and sniffs and stares. She will often go from door to door as if patrolling her yard. My hubby and I feed birds and squirrels in our yard in hopes that they will serve as entertainment for the cat. We have learned that we are overly entertained by our yard animals too. As I have posted before, the animals often distract me when I am doing a Nia routine or working out.

My hubby and I also have animal protocol, if there is an animal in the yard and we are on our way out to the yard, we stop and wait for it to settle or be gone. If we are in the yard and one comes in we freeze and let it do what it is there to do then we proceed. We often will stop what we are doing (pause a DVD, pause our conversation, etc.) to watch the various critters that come to visit. They are very entertaining. They eat, they play, they drink, they take baths. It is all very fun to watch. They can be quite silly.

We used to have blue jays come with their babies every year. They must have nested in our neighbor’s yard, because one year he drastically trimmed the trees and the babies that visit now are not nearly as young as the ones we used to have. So I believe the birds are having their babies elsewhere and sometimes they come here to eat or bath, but they are not here over a period of months as they once were. It is interesting and very amusing watching “babies” learn new things.

I believe the video included in this post is a group of “baby” hummingbirds. They are either babies or they are adults new to our yard and they have not seen the “house” that we allow our cat to go outside in. The hummingbirds swarm around the house to see what exactly is the threat of the animal inside. It is quite entertaining. They did this just a few times and have since learned that she is no threat and they act as if she is not there. The squirrels often check her out though. They climb on the table and peer in at her. She just looks back at them, rarely does she rush at them. She knows she can’t get them, but I don’t think they are always so sure.

On this video you can hear the birds making their little chitter noise. I imagine them saying, “What is it doing? What is it? Can it eat us?”

Baby Blue Jays – August 2009

terrepruitt — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 06:19:36 +0000

We have recently had baby blue jays surface. For the most part I don’t even know they are there. When they do make noise it is hilarious. I can’t tell how many there are. I think there are at least two, maybe three, but at least one has a hilarious voice. It is not the squawk of a blue jay yet. I can’t even describe it, but it makes me laugh. Whatever I am doing I will stop to listen to him. It is so funny. I tried to record it today, but . . . I only have my iPhone and the baby stopped the second I pressed record. Then all the other birds started in and drowned out his little voice.

Anyway, it is Thursday, and I haven’t posted birds once this month so I thought I would share some baby pictures. The babies are deceptively large. At first, you don’t realize that the baby is the baby because he is so much bigger than the adults then it opens its mouth and makes this pathetic noise or it walks and has absolutely no grace.

So, please keep in mind I am not posting this pictures because they are good pictures and I wanted to share, I am posting them because they are our babies and I wanted to share.

Its a beautiful day in San Jose for this bird to sit by the water.

Do you see his brother (sister?) on the rock behind him?

I think the one on the rock is the one that is has the funny little voice. It is so funny.

Babies just stand different. They are still learning. It is so funny to watch them move.

I think the one on the rock still wants to be fed because he will open his wings and make his little noise. He “screams” at the top of his voice. But scream is a harsh word since it sounds so cute, but . . . you can tell it is a workout for him. He puts a lot of effort into it.

Ooooh, balancing on one foot. Good.

Silhouettes

terrepruitt — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 07:01:51 +0000

I love these. At first I was disappointed because you can’t actually see the colors, but I looked at them again, and, I like them.

Look, you can see the tiny feet.

He’s not landing because he keeps getting chased off.

Their little feet are so cute!

I always think that we are so lucky because in San Jose, California, we get to see them for a long period during the year. And we have about eight. My friend just posted on FaceBook that she has too many to count. She has to fill her feeders twice a day. We have six feeders and we don’t fill them that much. When it is hot, it works out to maybe twice a week, but when it is cooler they don’t drink at much.

Hummingbirds In Our Yard

terrepruitt — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 06:27:31 +0000

I love to watch our hummingbirds. I have always wanted to try to film them. I know it is almost impossible given our equipment and our yard, but I thought I would try. Yes, I know I posted hummingbird pictures on my last “whatever” Thursday, but remember, my blog, my rules—and a lot of people seemed to enjoy the hummingbirds–maybe it was the tongue.

I think this is getting to be their kind of weather. I am going to warn you, you will probably see a lot of them on my blog—hopefully you’ll come back. They are so entertaining. And as I always say since we are in San Jose we have them for a long period of time. It just works out that way with our wonderful weather.

So I was outside for about an hour and a half. I shot about 100 videos. Most of them were just a few seconds long because that is how fast the hummingbirds are. A lot of them are clear, a lot of them are not. Our camera auto focuses and it has a difficult time with moving feeders.

My goal was to post a short video of a hummingbird flying and maybe feeding. Well, just as it was getting too dark to film—and the shots started getting grainy—I got this really long sequence of birds eating, flying, fighting, and just all around being the entertaining birds that they are. So I apologize that it is over 5 minutes long. Also, I apologize because I am talking throughout the video, but they actually smack each other. And they do it audibly. You might not be able to hear it on the video but I could hear it. And they would do it right over my head!

At one point, around 3.28 you’ll hear “wrrrrr” that is a bird flying over me and the microphone.

Hummingbird Tongues

terrepruitt — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 06:33:19 +0000

So my friend who writes Zebra Sounds included the fact that hummingbirds have tongues in her ”10 Things You Might Not Know“ post recently. I learned this after having watched them at our feeders (about 10 years ago). I had always thought that they used their beak as a straw, so imagine my surprise when I caught a tongue in a picture.

I was looking through my pictures for the tongue picture for her post — but we didn’t communicate well enough for her to actually use it, but in trying to find it for her, it got me looking at more of my hummingbird pictures.

Since I am not a professional photographer, I just have to sit there and take picture after picture and hope I end up with a good one. Sometimes I do.

I will try to learn more about hummingbirds and I will continue to take pictures and probably post more of some I have already taken. I have a lot. They fascincate me. And just like our other birds, since we live in San Jose and our weather is warmer for a longer season, we have birds around for six to seven months.

For now:

Their hearts beat about 21 times per second, their wings 55 – 75 times per second. They weight 1/10 of an ounce. They can feed on up to 1000 flowers a day. The hummingbird tongue licks up nectar at the rate of 13 licks per second. And they do eat insects.

Somewhat unrelated, to these pictures, I just wanted to mention, yesterday I was outside taking pictures and working out and one flew right up to me, within arm’s reach and just hovered where I was kneeling. I think they are a very curious bird. Maybe they are almost as curious about us as we are about them?

I want to remind my awesome readers that my pictures are all mine. I take them all myself and it is not cool at all to steal them.

Baby Blue Jay Bath

terrepruitt — Fri, 29 May 2009 06:05:39 +0000

This past summer we were lucky enough to be the home to six baby blue jays (maybe more it was difficult to keep track). It was fun to watch them grow up. I think most of the six have gone, but I think one is still here. I think others visit because we put peanuts out for them. Since we live in San Jose, we have great weather and blue jays are always here.

It was fun to watch their different “personalities” or styles. One exercised great caution and care when it came to bath time, another one, as you will see below . . . .would get in there and just have a ball.

These are from August 28, 2008.

I actually think this one, is the one that would be very careful.