Still time for baby birds

How many species have you seen migrating south already? I have mentioned how many shorebirds are on the way down, plus birds like orioles and warblers. Hawks - while not migrating yet in any semblance of big numbers - have begun to disperse from their breeding territories. Long-legged waders and terns are moving around to feed and young are getting a taste of life on their own. However, the last broods of some birds that nest multiple times in a season or those who breed later in the year, such as the always noticeable American Goldfinch, have yet to leave home or the care of their parents.

One of the most aggressive and common resident breeding birds is the Northern Mockingbird. These two fledglings blend right in to their unnatural surroundings, don't they?

I am not talking about aggressiveness in terms of bird-on-bird action, but rather humans, as the NoMo will go after you like to the point of physical impact in some cases if you are too close to their nest or fledged little ones. They have a temper that is distributed evenly to nearly any threat that becomes too much of an issue for them. When I was a child and trying to enjoy time outdoors in my yard I had to watch my head all of the years that a pair was nesting in a bush near our patio.

Suffice it to say, this mom and dad did not like me snapping photographs of these two, and if you could see more to the left side of that photo you would see a streak of white and gray flashing around me. I guess they frown on bird paparazzi, too.


Scott Kruitbosch
Conservation Technician


Photo © Scott Kruitbosch and not to be reproduced without explicit permission