Chirps and Cheeps

It's been one of the nice summers here in Western New York that I can remember.  We've only had a little rain and many, many beautiful, sunny, hot summer days. As summer draws to an end, I'm finding myself reflecting on all I've seen and learned this past year of birding. Being a "newbie", there was much to see with each season. I'm especially enjoying the juvenile birds of all species right now. They're beginning to emerge from their parents' protective cover and I'm seeing them in the yard and at the feeders more and more.

I saw one very interesting spectacle the other day: a young Brown-headed Cowbird was yelling to be fed and who was its surrogate parent but a much smaller male Dark-eyed Junco!  I couldn't believe my eyes as this large "baby" followed his anxious "dad" around demanding to be fed and the Junco hopped to it!

After a rather rare day of rain this week, I decided to set up my camera and focus on one of our bird feeders.  I don't know if anyone else has noticed this, but it seems the feeders become unusually busy after a rain!  I thought it might be fun to capture a few photos of the seed-eaters who frequent our bistro.