cute gnome(-: Birds look really happy with his meal too!!!

Jane, if you only have one feeder out, you might try a good mixture with black oil sunflower seeds stirred into it. Don't get the cheapie kind with those little reddish-brown "BB's" in it. I have never seen ANYTHING actually eat those. I get mine at PetSmart, and I really love the Stokes mixture that has no hulls in it. I feed it, black oiler sunflowers and safflower seed. Safflower seed goes into a feeder that doesn't have squirrel protection, because they don't really like it, but cardinals and titmice do. HOWEVER, no matter what you are feeding, there will be times when birds are not around for various reasons. I have hardly any right now, mostly due to a pair of hawks hanging about our neighborhood. And even without the hawks, birds often disappear for a few weeks now and then. One more thing...don't forget that WATER is probably even more important than seed in luring birds to your yard. You'll notice that most of Maureen's pictures feature her great birdbath. Be sure to provide several "baths" around the yard. They can be anything from decorative features to trashcan lids on the ground with 2" of water in them. I often turn clay pots upside down and put a clay saucer on top for water. Keep the water CLEAN and shallow, maybe even adding a rock in the center for birds to stand on. Good luck! Marcia

oh, I'd love to have some anna's or black-chinned or buff-bellied or calliope here, too, patrick, but I sure love the rubies! sarah, I was holding the camera, and was seated about 8 feet from the feeder. I was indoors, looking through the window. the optics and zoom on the canon s1-is are great, but already I want more pixels. this one is 3.2 megapixels. I sure am having fun with it, though. I hope my visitor is here again tomorrow!

Thanks everyone for all your encouragement. We do love our birds, and we love to share them with other bird lovers. :) terrene - We're shooting with four different superzoom cameras now, and this set includes images from all of them. Each of them has its strengths in different shooting situations, but I think the results we get usually depend more on lighting, distance, opportunity, and execution (or lack thereof) on our part, than it does on which camera we used on any given shot. And yes, Missy is still with us. She successfully fledged 13 more beautiful baby Blues this year, and is now the mother of 62 over the 5 seasons she's been using our nestbox. The group shot in the last image above is of the 5 fledglings from her 4th nest of the season. Thanks again, and happy birding all. Kenn