Missing MY Birds

The deck is far too quiet.  The birdfeeders don’t require a daily refill. I miss my birds but I can’t really blame them for leaving.  I had the audacity to be gone for three weeks, in winter no less, a Texas winter, but still.  Christmas came and went with no extra “sheath of wheat” from me.  I have a feeling that in my absence they found the neighbor with the way-deluxe feeder, which may explain their reluctance to dash back.  

 

The yard itself sports tons of juniper trees for any Cedar Waxwing types that flitted by, and thanks to the bumper crop of acorns the squirrels and Scrub jays were pretty self sufficient even before I left. 

 I am, however, doing my best to woe them back; putting out suet and high priced nyjer seed.  When I first returned, I only had sunflower seeds and thought that would be kind on my part not to dilute it with the cheap millet stuff.  Then I realized that if I was desperate enough to want sparrows and white winged doves back, I would have to get the mixed seed and so I did.

What an irony eh? If you were to look back at some of last years blogs you would see I was cursing the bane of too many House sparrows and also moaning about the Pine Siskins that settled down to eat nyger seed by the bucket full, through winter and far deeper into spring then they should have.  I kept telling them to get to Canada before it was too late and they got caught in our Texas oven summer.  I remember reading they were fickle birds that may camp out with you one winter and be nowhere in sight for several winters after.  In my present birdless state, would I welcome them back?  Perhaps.

But of course I exaggerate.  I have one feeder in the back of the property and several cardinals are visiting that one, they are just not coming up to greet me on the deck.  And I hear the wrens, both Carolina and Bewick’s who only need me to provide places for them to hop about on and have always fended for themselves, food wise. Today, I had a brief visit from some Lesser Goldfinch who didn’t seem to notice the high priced nyger but went to the feeder with the cheap stuff.  And actually the first bird to visit the suet was a Ruby Crowned Kinglet, perhaps a female or a male who is keeping his red crown under wraps.  Now that I think of it, I have heard and seen a few Carolina chickadees and Titmice, it’s just that they were here in much greater numbers before I headed to Maine. 

Now, perhaps a lot of you are thinking, isn’t Texas the grand wintering spot for many birds?  I believe it is, but more so along the coast than here.  Actually, how I wish I had a travel buddy, for I do hear there are pelicans at Mitchell Lake not that far south of San Antonio, which I need to go check out.  And embarrassingly, I haven’t been to Padre Island or Aransas yet.   But my New Years resolution is to force my husband to occasionally leave the paper work behind and go play.  Let’s hope then that some future blogs will be about me being wowed by Whopping cranes or tickled to see mass amounts of pelicans. 

But for now, I shall go smear a little peanut butter on the suet in hopes that that might appeal to some bird palate out there.  And should they return, and should they start gobbling seed at an alarming rate again, you shall have to remind me that I have forfeited my right to complain about it!