Towheeblog

UPDATE; Again today the Canadian (en passant) robin was sensed at Ankeny NWR by our Motus Tower.

I may never get a better shot of my distinguished wintering guest, being shy he only poses when I am inside behind a window:

You get used to some neighbors’ visiting. Then suddenly they turn away. The local turkeys came January 1, then were absent. They returned Sunday, Jan. 8 and came multiple times each day, until yesterday, Thursday was the last time we saw them. We were away from home that afternoon so when they ambled back for afternoon tea I was not here to serve. Is that when they decided to go to an alternative feeding station for awhile?

Above, after the turkeys: crow leaves; green-wings at Fairview Wetlands; cacklers there as well; squirrels being pigs; sunrise; whitge-throat; Spotted Towhee female.

Two turkeys chased one another around a bush, ring-around-the-rosey. One would be the aggressor, then the other. They never actually caught one another, as if they intended to chase, but not catch. Both went the same direction at the same time. When one reversed so did the other, never coming beak-to-beak. Unlike the farm chickens I grew up around, these large fowl seem to do a great deal of feint and gesture and threat, not much actual bloodshed. Perhaps that is because these birds are not fenced in?

ALFRED NORTH GOLDFINCH
This Whitehead is not a philosopher (for all I know) but an American Goldfinch, leucistic:

Cornell’s bird mag has piece on birds for eye and ear…art and song–click here.