Naturally

 Blue jays and peanuts. Pluck and chuck.
 It was gray anatomies as juncos covered the ground feeding on the millet I’d put out for them. The dark-eyed juncos flash white outer tail feathers in flight.
 It was a gray sack hanging from a branch.  I’d walked the nearby trail regularly and didn’t notice the Baltimore oriole nest until the tree had shed its leaves. It had been a bustling bag of baby birds not long before. The female is the primary architect with an unbelievable weaving artistry. They build nests well enough that some survive several years. A nest includes hundreds of fibrous strands of plant material (grapevine, various kinds of grass, dogbane, milkweed and others) as well as yarn or string.
 Hanging around with the juncos are some American tree sparrows. European settlers incorrectly named them because the birds reminded them of Eurasian tree sparrows back home. American tree sparrows are ground birds. They forage on the ground, nest on the ground and breed in scrubby areas near the northern treeline. It’s a small sparrow with a long, notched tail and an unstreaked gray-brown breast and belly with a dark spot in the center. The upper mandible of its bill is dark and the lower is yellow. It has a rusty cap and eye-line, and a gray face.
 Birds are fine company. I watched chickadees enhance my yard. How do they survive winter? Birds have systems in place. Small songbirds migrating through and those who winter here often associate with chickadee flocks. These followers listen to the voices of their chickadee leaders chasing the moment and when they hear an alarm note, they react.

Q&A

 “Do polar bears hibernate?” Only the pregnant polar bear females enter a den for months at a time (October-March) to give birth to cubs and nurse them for the first three months of their lives. Other polar bears are outside during the winter, hunting seals and getting by. The female may lower her heart rate, her metabolism and breathing rate in the den, but not to the point of a true hibernator. She is in a state of “light hibernation,” which allows her to minimize the amount of energy needed to stay alive while tending to her cubs. Prior research had hinted that all polar bears were capable of a walking hibernation, a period of decreased metabolism undertaken by bears during the summer and fall in response to a lack of hunting opportunities. A new study found no evidence to support this theory. There was no indication that polar bears could adjust their metabolism enough to deal with a scarcity of prey.
 “I saw a catbird feeding on the white berries of poison ivy this fall. What else eats them?” Here are some plucked from a long list of chowhounds who refuse to let the leaves of three be: American robins, deer, raccoons, cardinals, eastern bluebirds, woodpeckers, crows, wild turkeys, bobwhite quail, squirrels, chickadees, tufted titmice, black bears, yellow-rumped warblers, cedar waxwings and more.
 “Why don’t small birds fly in V-formations like geese?” A goose gets a lift from the wingtips of the goose flying in front of it. Small songbirds wouldn’t create enough of an updraft to make a V-formation useful. 
 “What duck dives the deepest?” The long-tailed duck is likely the champion diver as they dive as deep as 200 feet to forage. 
 “Why don’t the feet of songbirds freeze?” Their feet are mostly bones, sinew and scale with little muscle or nerves. The feet lack sweat glands, so they stay dry. The arteries that transport blood to the legs are in contact with the veins that return blood to the bird’s heart. This allows the heat to be transferred between the two, keeping the feet warm.
 “Give me some weather folklore involving birds.” Your wish is my command. When cranes are aloft, the day is soft. Swallows soar, good weather more. A robin singing at dawn while facing west, means a change in the weather by noon. If a robin sings loudly from the top of a tree, expect a storm. When a woodpecker pecks low on a tree, expect warm weather. A loon calls loudest before a storm.
 “What is a meadow wink?” It’s a nickname for the bobolink. Other nicknames include skunk blackbird, ricebird, reedbird and butterbird. Breeding male bobolinks are the only North American bird with a white back and black underparts, and have been described as a bird wearing a tuxedo backward.

Thanks for stopping by 

  “It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into.”—Jonathan Swift.
  “I’ve learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way she or he handles three things; A rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights”—Maya Angelou.
  Do good.

©️Al Batt 2022

The sight of a bluebird has long been associated with happiness, good luck and joy. I hope this photo brings you all of those. Have a bluebird day. Eastern bluebirds photo by Al Batt.

An award-winning children’s book on collective nouns presented wonderfully.

There are stories, lessons and tips galore for animal lovers who get to shadow a world-class veterinarian in the pages of this book.

This fine book led me to recall sitting in all-day-breakfast eateries, talking with friends about slow birding—taking the time needed to really look at and learn about a bird. Joan found blue jays are the 6th most googled bird, and white brows on a male white-throated sparrow suggest it might be a philanderer.