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A new vote was taken

12 years ago

I've been getting about a dozen house finches still coming to my feeder which is really unusal as they are usually gone south by now. Last winter I actually had a male and female stay the whole winter. Well, on Nov. 22 these guys were all puffed up trying to stay warm as we had a bitterly cold day; - 28 degrees celcius with a wind chill of -38 degrees. A couple of days later we had a strong northerly wind and I think they took a revote and caught the next flight south. I haven't seen them for days now so I'm sure they are enjoying themselves in a much warmer climate.

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Comments (6)

TXSkeeter
12 years ago
Personally, I'd have asked for that vote far earlier if I was in that flock. Maybe there was a filibuster from the lone holdout who didn't want to leave the old home place.
We usually think of small birds as being rather dainty and helpless but they're far tougher that we usually give them credit for...
Steve
catherinet
12 years ago
I'm in zone 5. I'm finding that we have birds here through the winters who never used to be here at that time before. (Climate change?).....like Carolina Wrens and Bluebirds. Hopefully the schizophrenic weather we've been having doesn't make life more difficult for them, and they can hang in there.
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Dr.Nature
12 years ago
I'll keep my eye out for them. I'm in Zone 10B at the very southern tip of Florida south of Miami. It was 72 degrees here this morning so I broke out my flannel tank top and fur-lined flip flops!
surya55_gw
12 years ago
Catherinet- I too have birds such as "resident" robins, carolina wrens and bluebirds in ny year-round...
joan754
Original Author
12 years ago
Lol Dr. Nature - 72 degrees huh? I'll think of you over the next 3-4 months as I brave our winters here. Actually, I was surprised to see a new male house finch at the feeder the other day. He was alone - no female with him which I thought was odd. Then yesterday I saw a female at the feeder and today another female. So some other ones have decided, for the time being anyway, to brave our winters. Would be nice if they stayed as my feeders have gone unusually quiet the last week or so. I have my chickadees that come around, but haven't seen the downy woodpecker that was coming for about a week now and haven't yet seen any red-breasted nuthatches. I live in an urban setting so I don't get any of the grosbeaks or crossbills but I'm still hoping that some day they might find my feeder.
pinetree30
12 years ago
I live in the Sierra Nevada foothills, on the edge of the foothill oaks/ponderosa pine zones, about 1800 ft. elevation. Last summer we had very few of the feeder crowd -- mainly a flock of goldfinches, but also house finches, black-headed grosbeaks, oak titmouse, California and spotted towhees, acorn woodpeckers and white-breasted nuthatches. The bird drought continues, though a couple of juncos just stopped by looking for fallen seeds.
Has anyone else in my zone experienced greatly diminished bird populations this past year, or am I just having randomly poor luck?

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