American Goldfinches

It's been very interesting to watch the American Goldfinches. 

When we arrive in Florida in September, we rarely see any. Our feeders host lots of Pine Warblers, but not many finches. They begin to trickle in starting in November and the numbers grow throughout the winter months. By February, we have so many that we are filling the sunflower feeders almost daily.

Last week, we had about 200 on the feeders, the ground and in our oak tree.

The next day, they were gone. This Yellow-rumped Warbler had the feeders all to himself!

This year we have two Sherman Fox Squirrels that visit almost daily. There has been a lot of new construction in the area so we don't see the numbers as in previous years. I hope they are ok.

Any day that we see a Pileated Woodpecker is a good day!

We had an unusual visitor this morning - a Brown-headed Cowbird.

Our beautiful Bluebirds are much more welcome!

In other news, this is a sink hole that opened up in a drainage ditch in front of a neighboring community. Scary!

Still Sewing and Watching the Birds

My sewing machine has been smoking this season! I've made several quilts, matching pillow cases and pillow shams, aprons, market and mondo bags and lots and lots of small crafty items with our sewing group. The past couple of weeks I have been trying to make purses.

I just finished this one. It has a zipper inside which, for me, was a challenge.

This is the first one I did for Bill's daughter Laura. The blue material is pre-quilted and thick enough that I did not use batting. This one does not have a zipper - I put in a magnetic snap.

My daughter spends her days in the OR and needed some fun scrub hats. I couldn't find a decent pattern so made several prototypes before hitting on the right method. So far Laura has 5 she can wear and there are several more ready to go.

 This has not been the best birding year. Not until the Cedar Waxwings showed up!

I swim every morning from 7 to 8 and the trees outside the pool building were full of berries until hundreds of birds arrived to eat every last one.

Our droves of American Goldfinches are finally getting some color.

For the last 6 weeks they have all looked drab like the 2 birds on the upper left in the picture.

I believe this is a Savannah Sparrow.

Our wonderful Florida Fox Squirrels continue to visit every day. We have had as many as five at a time under the feeders. This is the one that is missing most of his tail.

This is what their tails should look like.

Yesterday, Bill thought he saw a humming bird. Today we bought a hummingbird feeder and tonight we had two amazing little  Ruby-throated Hummingbirds come to visit.

Our Last Week in Florida

I sure am going to miss these cute little guys when we leave later this week to return to Colorado!

Birding has been good the last week as the summer birds return.

These are the first Eastern Kingbirds I've ever seen in the back. We see them everyday now.

Eastern Kingbird sitting atop a thistle and hiding behind the growing wildflowers and weeds.

A small flock was migrating through on Easter morning with several Blue Grosbeaks. Delightful eye candy!

They were pretty far out in the back.

The Savannah Sparrows are regular visitors.

Another not-so-regular visitor is this Great-crested Flycatcher.

Ah-h-h. Aren't my love birds cute? Don't you just wonder what they are saying to each other?

Florida's Endangered Sherman Fox Squirrel

Whatever you call them, fox squirrels, monkey squirrels, raccoon-face squirrels or Sherman Fox Squirrels, they are a species of "special concern" here in Florida - but NOT in our backyard! Today we had FIVE visiting the feeders at the same time!

They seem to have two color variations - grey and red.

These squirrels are much larger than their common grey cousins. This is one of the red ones.

And this one is much lighter - grey and buff.

Their tails are as long as their bodies.

This is our short-tailed Fox Squirrel. We assume he lost his tail in an accident. We first saw him last year. This year his tail has actually grown the white tuft of fur at the end.

Bill took this shot to show his l-o-n-g tail. We certainly enjoy our daily visitors.

Spring has Sprung!

It's Spring in Ocala and the birds are getting more and more colorful and we are seeing more pairs. Last week was Spring Break and we had visitors from Colorado, Bill's daughter and her family, and naturally, we took them birding!

We didn't have to go very far to see this beautiful Bluebird...

..or this pair of Goldfinches. The American Goldfinches are sporting their vivid yellow colors and are showing up in huge flocks - eating us out of house and home - getting ready to head north.

Our Sherman Fox Squirrels are still showing up every day. We have as many as three at a time.

The Cedar Waxwings came by in huge numbers - but boy they are hard to photograph!!

We took the family to Rainbow Springs State Park and Bill and I walked around while the kids kayaked. We saw tons of Cardinals.

 It's always an especially good day when we see a Pileated Woodpecker!

I don't usually bother with the Grey Squirrels - but this little guy was just so cute!

This was the day of the Carolina Wrens - they were everywhere singing their little hearts out!

We wanted the kids to see Alligators - up close and personal - so we spent a day at Paines Prairie. Even this Boat-tailed Grackle is showing beautiful colors!

All of the usual herons, egrets and ibis were there - including this Snowy Egret. You can see that he is growing his breeding feathers.

Ms. Cardinal with a dirty beak. She's been playing in the mud.

The kids saw lots and lots of huge alligators - and this baby one.

This might be my best picture of a Palm Warbler.

I finished the quilt with the vegetable theme. I named it "Eat Your Veggies." It is a gift for an avid gardener.

The house is quiet now that our company is gone, but we had a great visit. The grandchildren were a delight. We will see them again in less than a month when we return to Colorado for the summer.