That's awsome Rita! Sarah

Hi Rita/ we're almost neighbors/ and imagine my delight when I read your bio and saw where you "are"..that means they may be near us soon !! We moved into an adorable cottage on a lake with lots of trees/ of course the feeders went up right away/ and the kids in the neighborhood are now "watching" my birds and squirrel antics. Teen next door was going to school one day/ and let out a blood curdeling scream/ all went out the door fearing the worst .. only to find her staring up into an oak tree --eyes wide with delight when she spotted her first beautiful orioles. So will have to let her know tonight they are on their way/ but must make her not to "scare us half to death" this year.. LOL

Teriffic news Rita!
congratulations!
-stephen

I love these oriole stories and would like to share one of my own. I garden in the northern Catskills and last summer left a big blue plastic-weave tarp in the garden to protect/cover some hay bales. An oriole pair started visiting the tarp and plucking strands of the plastic from the tarp and then flying off, presumably to build their nest. For several days, the pair returned. The male would observe or stand guard while the female WORKED that tarp, really putting energy into plucking long strands of blue weaving material. I looked everywhere that summer for the "blue nest" I imagined they'd built but never found it. It wasn't until October, when the leaves were down, that I decided to look again and sure enough, way up high in a nearby tree: a beautiful blue oriole nest! I love the visual image this conjures: bright orange birds in a brilliant blue nest.

I was just watching the female Oriole strip some of the milkweed stalks so nest building is under way around here.

I find that out here in Southern California the orioles are the last bird to go in for the night. I can still hear them "chattering" while I am putting my tools away for the day.

Two years in a row we had a male oriole feeding at our feeder in the winter. I have lived in Georgia since 1976 and had never seen one here until these last two winters. I was wondering if that was unusal or normal for an oriole?
Lynn

I was out planting tomatoes in my veggie garden today and the female oriole was around most of the time. She would pick here and there, looking for nesting material. Didn't seem to mind me too much although she would watch me as if I didn't belong out in the garden.

WOW... I had one today!!..... brilliant orange this year! I should of know.. same as last year/ appears almost on the day the old apple tree in back yard burst into blossoms!!

Our first one in Central Mass yesterday!! Beautiful male.

Still waiting for the first hummingbird of the season. They are late this year.

Sully,, I wonder if this chilly weather has anything to do with the birds not reaching us yet? Looks like this coming week will be warmer, with nights a little less cold.

The past week I have been seeing flocks of Orioles passing thru many times a day. These are juveniles and or females (I can never tell the difference) but no adult males. I never see less than 10 or so and sometimes many more. They go around on the shrubs and flowering plants pecking into everything. I don't know if they are looking for bugs.

The strangest thing is that they are plucking petals off the flowers. They either pluck petals from the coneflowers or parts of petals. I think they eat them because I don't see the petals on the ground. The stick their beaks into the open daylily flowers and even into the ones that are not open yet, forcing their beak into the seams where the daylilies will open.

Then they are also plucking the petals off a hedge of small red roses I have near my daylilies and Purple Coneflowers. Those I find scattered on the ground under the shrubs. I have watched this go on many times a day for at least the past week. Really strange.

Well, my Orioles were late this year and only came back today that I could tell. I heard them singing all day today from the big, big oak tree that they make their nest in. Finially I spotted them quickly as they were flying.

That same Oak tree has been busy today as there were Redwing Blackbirds hanging out there all day as well as the Redbellied woodpeckers, Bluejays, Cardinals and others.