Two groups of feathered beasts are in a hurry these past few days. Both the hummingbirds and the finches are eating continuously. The hummingbirds are fighting off each other at their nectar feeders, even though there is room at each feeder for 4 birds at a time. They are fierce in their determination not to share, chasing one another off with dive bomb attacks.
The finches share easily and all the time – I have counted 12 at least finches on that long skinny feeder at a time. And they only eat thistle. I have bought what is labeled as finch food and had no takers. So now they’ve trained me to buy good thistle and there are finches everywhere – plus the wonderful black-capped chickadees. The chickadees hang out year round. And many of the finches do as well. But some are obviously going to migrate, because they are stuffing their little tummies full, emptying that feeder at least once a day, when in the height of summer, a full feeder would last several days.
There is already a migrator, on the regular bird feed feeder – the white breasted nuthatch, which is so easy to spot – because s/he eats head first, going down the feeder. The only one who does. The hummers will all be gone in the next few days. I’m surprised this cold gray rainy-ness hasn’t already convinced them to move on.
The squirrels now have acorns galore to hide in every flower pot and garden bed, so they have been a bit less likely to tear down the bird feeders. They have however learned to empty one of the nectar feeders somehow. Now that I’m back in town, I shall have to learn their secret!