The common chiffchaff

Go, little leaf warbler, go!

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Taffy R.I.P.

The day after one of my oldest and best parakeet hens died, a new baby hatched. Taffy took over the mothering duties and raised nearly 30 babies in my aviary, most not her own. She was protective and attentive. She liked fresh strawberries and cilantro best. Taffy was a hopper, which meant she could not fly. People who don't want their birds to fly away, often snip off feathers that don't grow back well. Essentially, they take away a big part of their birdness. That said, I tried to give Taffy a good, uncaged life. Her partner, Xero, also a hopper, keeps hopping around looking for her. It's kind of sad. 

I buried Taffy in the backyard in a flower garden where I've buried, over the years, other birds from my aviary. 

Otis wasn't terribly torn up. He walked over and pecked my foot, as he often does, to let me know, "Hey, a-hole. More seeds."

If a bird could wear little cool-guy sunglasses, that would be Otis. Sky blue and cloud-white Otis. 

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Carrier pigeons

Inside the corner of a corrugated iron shed. Two pigeons are standing on perches and a third bird is sitting in a roost. Both of the standing birds are missing a leg. Army horses, messenger dogs and carrier pigeons were all very vulnerable, not only to enemy fire, but also to gas and to disease.

 

In the middle of the carnage in which so many men died, wounded pigeons were being treated. However, they could still be used for breeding and were, therefore, a valuable resource.

 

--National Library of Scotland

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Posts

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Thanks, Luke!

Email and photos from "Frog Applause" reader (madbutnotcrazy)

 Hello Teresa,

I'm glad you love my birds, they mean a lot to me. 

We have 6 adult birds, ranging in age from 6 years down to 1, and 7 babies currently in nests (6 and 1 with different parents).

One of our birds is more tame, she is Koko and is 18 months old.

We are hoping to tame a few of the babies when they are 4 weeks old (this weekend). This will involve feeding them 3 times per day using a liquid formula.

Our birds are all kakarikis (NZ parakeets). They are slightly bigger than budgies. If you look on Youtube for videos of baby kakarikis being fed it is cuteness overload.

I am sending you a couple of pictures of our adults (you can use them if you wish). The yellow bird is our oldest, she is 6.5 years, her name is Pikachu. There is also a photo of a pied male Pepe (5 yo), posing with a budgie for size comparison. 

The other pied bird is our friendliest, Koko (1.5 years old). 

And as a bonus I have included a picture of our wild rainbow lorikeets. There are 3 and they come to our garden every day for fresh pears (I am spending a fortune on pears!).

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Get involved with vulture nest research

 https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSceeDx6afnylk62LmUv2DbHKJTHt9iIzucHJBzVK3d8YMws1Q/viewform

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How to tell a raven from a crow

 

Raven

Crow

Click here to listen to their calls.

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Gift-giving crows

https://www.audubon.org/news/did-crows-actually-make-these-gifts-human-who-feeds-them

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Anting

Anting is a maintenance behavior during which birds rub insects, usually ants, on their feathers and skin. The bird may pick up the insects in its bill and rub them on the body (active anting), or the bird may lie in an area of high density of the insects and perform dust bathing-like movements (passive anting). The insects secrete liquids containing chemicals such as formic acid, which can act as an insecticide, miticide, fungicide, or bactericide. Alternatively, anting could make the insects edible by removing the distasteful acid, or, possibly supplement the bird's own preen oil. Instead of ants, birds can also use garlic snails, amphipods, millipedes, dermapterans, caterpillars, grasshoppers, hemipterans, mealworm larvae, and wasps. More than 200 species of bird are known to ant.

20 common birds that ant

Ruffed Grouse
Wild Turkey
Great Horned Owl
Northern Flicker
Cedar Waxwing
Northern Mockingbird
Gray Catbird
Veery
Wood Thrush
American Robin
Golden-crowned Kinglet
Dark-eyed Junco
Song Sparrow
Northern Cardinal
Rose-breasted Grosbeak
Baltimore Oriole
Red-winged Blackbird
House Sparrow
American Crow
Common Raven

Read more about anting here and here.

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Ravens stealing food at Costco

 

Ravens have been plundering shopping carts at a Costco parking lot in Anchorage, Alaska. One poor sap turned around and two of these winged-raiders made off with a short rib, tearing it right out of its packaging and flying away, presumably to feast at their evil lair.

Story here.

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