I've got pretty good at identifying all the birds I can see from my window by sight, so I've been trying to learn their songs so I can tell which ones are around even when I can't spot them, which is getting harder now that the leaves have all grown back on the trees. When I hear a great tit close by I know they're going to show up at the feeder any second, so it's also helped me spot them more often.

I have many birds feeding in the yard including house finches, sparrows, and gold finches which are feeding on seeds.  I also had a Baltimore oriole feeding on an orange and a wood thrush scrapping in the leaf litter under the corneliancherry dogwoods.  I like using multiple field guides for identification.  I find different field guides will have some different information which will help me positively identify the bird.  They also provide different pictures.  I will then go on the internet to listen to their song.

Eurasian blue tit (cyanistes caeruleus), Modena, Italy

• Great tit (parus major), Modena, Italy
  
  ACTIVITY 1: Around my house I see a lot of Eurasian blue tit (cyanistes caeruleus) and Great tit (parus major). They could seem very similar at a first view and from far away. But the first is smaller, more rounded and has a shorter bill compared to the head.

ACTIVITY 2: considering the European serin, the European goldfinch and the common firecrest they all have some yellow part. The first has the majority of the chest, the second has wing patches and the third a cap. Using the Merlin app it is possible to easily distinguish the from the size, the shape and the other body pattern that they have.

I have been doing a lot of bird watching as a pandemic escape and the Merlin Bird ID app works fantastic.  Last weekend,  on my hike we spotted a lot of very different birds.  Activity 1:  I found a large hawk size bird and a small sparrow size bird but did not know either one.  With the app's questions, I easily came to a Black-crowned Night Heron and a White-throated Sparrow.  The Heron was such a find as it was sleeping in some bushes.  Activity 2:  I spotted several different kind of woodpeckers.  All had a combination of red, black and white.  I really had to work at telling the difference between a Hairy Woodpecker  and a Downy Woodpecker but I do think I got it once looking at the becks.  The other woodpecker I identified was the the Red-bellied Wookpecker.  It is easier than the other two because their pattern is different.  Activity 3:  I found three different type of birds looking for food and ID them but there food foraging was very different- Great Blue Heron was fishing in the the river, the Black Rumped Warbler was moving around the top of a blooming tree and a White-Breasted Nut Hatch looking for bugs on a tree trunk.  Activity 4: One of my favorite is the Baltimore Oriole.  First spotting of the season,  I used it color scheme-bright orange and black,  its size - robinish and it's call to ID it.   After doing this lesson, I tried the photo id option in Merlin.  I had a picture take of the Oriole and it ID it perfectly.  I would try using it.  My picture quality was not the best and it still worked great.

Osprey nesting and Great Blue Heron. Walking along a pond in Eagle, ID

For Activity 1 I watched the Bird Cam at the feeder in Sapsucker woods at Cornell lab.  I used Merlin to ID a couple of the birds-but by size/shape I could right away tell apart European Starling from Black Capped Chickadee.  Other birds I ID'd at the feeder using Merlin were Red winged Blackbird and Baltimore Oriole (adult female).  The Bird Cams are pretty cool-they're a great feature to use especially right now!

For Activity 3, I saw a mallard looking for food in the pond/wetland area in our backyard.  An American Robin was pecking at the ground around the neighborhood, and I also saw a Killdeer during my run that had been on the ground and took off as I went by.  The Killdeer was tricky to ID using Merlin, I didn't put in the right identifiers at first, but luckily I had seen it's back/tail as it flew away so I saw the orangey/brown color on it's rump/tail.  It's shape in the air and it's call helped me confirm that's what I saw as well.

For activity 2 we went to the Iroquois National Wildlife Refuge and saw so many birds, even a Trumpeter swan (we think, as it was hard to see the bill color to be certain).  But what was challenging was seeing eagles, ospreys and turkey vultures.  At times it was hard to say for sure what was flying overhead due to the dark colors on all.  We used the Merlin app and it did help.

For activity 1 at my home feeder, I can tell the difference by the shapes because I know the birds that regularly come to my feeder, and have identified them in the past.  It is more difficult to tell just by shape in the wild, it is needed to know the size also, and maybe the color or sound will help to.  We saw tree swallows and sparrows and the shape of the bird and its flight was enough to help differentiate.

I love learning these new ways of looking at birds in this course!!!

Act.1  today I saw two black birds one was a crow and one was a starling. They differed by size and shape  (as well as behavior).

Act3 Today I watched three birds looking for food. The cat bird was  on the ground flitting in low bushes and  sorting through leaves (looking for insects). The dove  was also on the ground  but stayed under the bird feeder looking for seeds.The cardinal flew from branch to branch in the trees and onto the bird feeder to eat seeds.

Act4 I like the gold finches . They are small like a sparrow. Their coloring in the winter is an olive/brown color  with darker stripes on their wings. In the late spring an summer the male is bright yellow with black wings, cap and tail. The female is more green on her back  and a duller yellow on her abdomen. They like seeds and perch on flower stem and grasses to eat seeds. They live in fields, bushes and roadsides. They have an undulating flight and  have a sweet, high four syllable song.

The Merlin app is very useful. I have been able to learn more about other species in our area that I was having trouble identifying such as  the Eastern Phoebe. A couple of pairs of  Eastern Phoebes are nesting nearby.

Am still working on identifying some other species ... it is a great exercise.

Canada goose pair spotted in the neighborhood.

Enjoy seeing them fly overhead.

 

I am in Yorktown, Westchester County.

Activity 1: This morning  on my walk, a red-tailed hawk swooped down and landed on a tree branch in front of me. It just sat there as I stood still with no camera!  Right after that, a downy woodpecker came by. Definitely, two different shapes!

Activity 2: Yesterday, at Croton Riverwalk, I used to Merlin to identify a pair of red-winged blackbirds and a grackle, obviously blackbirds.

Activity 3: At my birdfeeder, the chipping sparrow with land on the feeder to feed. The mourning doves will feed underneath the feeder, while the robins are hopping all over my yard.

Activity 4: So there is an famous eagle’s nest at FDR State Park, that can be seen off the Taconic Parkway. It has become a pandemic escape to go over to the park in the evening and watch at least one eagle perched in the trees. The nest has eaglets in it and it is a joy to watch.

I have found the Merlin app most helpful and oh so easy to use! I have used it numerous times. The amount of information in the app is really something. Just a little swiping and you can find the sound it makes and a map.

Describe a bird;

small in size, larger than a sparrow, smaller than a robin; habitat forest, eats at bird feeders, small thick orange beak, bright yellow  head, belly and back, bars on the wings mostly black in color, black forehead.

 Bird ID Activity 1: This is a photo from last year just after I got my 40-150 sense for Olympus.  I think this is a coopers hawk from my previous searches through the bird guides that I have.  It is a juvenile that I saw hunt in the neighborhood a few times.  A feature not captured in a photo is its fan shaped tail that appears white with black stripes, ie the white is 50% broader than the black on the tail.  Merlin from my descriptions suggests a red shouldered hawk is more likely in Florida.

Pertinent to this exercise though, another bird hunts in the neighborhood as well.  It is a little smaller with a long forked tail.  It is a swallow tailed kite.  I don't have a good picture but once you have seen one fly nearby, it is impossible not to recognize.

Activity one: the black headed grosbeak and the hooded oriole are the two birds in my yard I used for comparison. They are very similar in color but the grosbeak has a much broader beak than the oriole. The body is also slimmer on the grosbeak and more rounded on the oriole.

activity two: I had a woodpecker in my backyard that does not come up in the app for my location. The markings are most similar to a yellow bellied sap sucker. I have also found a picture of a red naped sapsucker that is also very similar. It was definitely not the hairy woodpecker or the ladder-backed woodpecker that came up in the app.

Activity three: the roofers hummingbirds search for food among the flowering shrubs in my backyard. The spotted towhee hops around in the grass, and the Woodhouse you activity three: the roofers hummingbirds search for food among the flowering shrubs in my backyard. The spotted towhee hops around in the grass, and the Woodhouse’s scrub jays prefer the suet over the birdseed.

activity four: hooded oriole, Size is between a sparrow and a robin, shape is rounded like a robin, black mask and bib, bright orange head and chest, black wings with white bars. Beak is dark, narrow, and slightly curved.

I have just begin birdwatching casually, so just observing whoever may be passing through the front or back yard, so I will be a bit flexible with my responses:

Activity 1: I can tell apart Common Grackles and Robins by shape as the grace is less rotund and has a more striking tail.

Activity 2: I have identified Common Grackles, Cardinals, and Red Wing Blackbirds as three birds that have black coloring. The grackle has it as an eye ring and pupil, the blackbird is almost wholly black except for the patch of red, and the northern cardinal has a black mask behind its beak.

Activity 3: I have seen morning doves, robins, and song sparrows prospecting amongst the lawn for something to eat, whether insect or seeds I could not tell.

Activity 4: It's tough to pin down a favorite, but I think my favorites are the most uncommon for me to observe casually, whether Orioles, Mockingbirds, or Merlins. I'll describe the Orioles because the first time I saw them was yesterday; they appeared to be mating or competing for a mate by hopping from tree limb to tree limb. They appeared to be feeding at flowers on a nearby shrub, and they featured very striking and easily discernible colors with an orange breast and black upper body and white wing flashes.

Activity 1:  When I first began feeding birds, I had lots of small brown birds which I assumed were all wrens.  I soon realized that most were actually sparrows.  I first used characteristics of shape to separate the wrens from the sparrows:  the wrens' tail position (cocked up) and their longer, curved beak.  I can now use color as well, but I am still trying to figure out all the striping patters on the sparrows!  Activity 2:  We'd gotten used to seeing downy woodpeckers, so we did a double-take when the first red-breasted grosbeak appeared.  The black and white and red colors are striking!  I don't think we've seen hairy woodpeckers or red-headed woodpeckers in our yard so far this year, but I'll be watching for them.  One day this year I had three brown birds in the yard, on the ground, at nearly the same time:  a wren, a thrush and a thrasher.  It was a bit like small, medium and large.  I haven't seen the thrush again, but the other two are reliable visitors.  Activity 3:  Just today I've seen the mourning doves waddling across the ground looking for seeds, the black-capped chickadee visiting quickly to grab a seed to carry away, and a gray catbird lingering at the feeders to peck at cranberries and the grape-jelly topped orange half.  Activity 4:  In the previous lesson I said that nuthatches were my favorite and that I primarily used their behavior (climbing down head-first) to identify them.  Their lovely bluish-gray, black and white coloring distinguishes them from the other smallish birds.  Their profile differs distinctly from the tufted titmouse which is similar in size and color.

Activity 4 Favourite Bird
White-crowned Sparrow. My favorite bird is always my last “best” bird. They can be the best because they are rare, they can be the best because it is the first time I have ever seen one, and they can be the best because it is the first time that I confidently and correctly identified them myself for the first time. That happened to me today (May 1, 2020) with a White-crowned Sparrow that was fleetingly at my feeders. I find sparrows challenging, and I have been working on them, so this was a bit of personal achievement for me.
White-crowned sparrows are sparrow sized and shaped; not unusually large or small. They are a grey and brown bird with a clear grey breast and bold white and black stripes on their heads, like a bicycle helmet. They are ground foragers and tend to the forest edges and scrub areas. They can winter in my area which is far south-western Ontario near the Detroit River, but they breed up in the far north boreal forest. So this guy was going somewhere when he stopped briefly at my backyard feeder.

Activity 3 3 Birds Foraging Behavior
American Robin, House Sparrow, Mourning Dove. I list these 3 birds because they are in my backyard regularly and have very different foraging behaviors. Only the House Sparrow feeds directly from the feeders. The Mourning Doves forage from the ground. The Robins never come near the feeders but hop about on the grass or in the gardens looking for insects at this time of year.

Activity #2 3 birds the same colour
Chipping Sparrow, American Tree Sparrow, Field Sparrow. These are three little brown birds that take some practise to separate in the field. All three are rufous brown, grey, and black. All three have unstreaked breasts, rufous crowns, and eye-stripes, so you have to remember to carefully note the important features as these little birds bounce about. Here is what I look for
American tree sparrow: bi-colored bill, black spot on the chest
Chipping sparrow – no spot, white supercilium and brown eyeline
Field Sparrow – pink bill, light colored legs, slightly white eye-ring, generally “pink and buffier” than the American tree, and Chipping Sparrows.

American Tree Sparrow



Chipping Sparrow



Field Sparrow

Activity #1 2 Birds by shape
Red-winged Blackbird and Common Grackle. Both of these birds are in the same family of Icterids, but, forage and move differently and are found in different habitats. Except this year, they are both in my backyard! The Grackle is and bigger and more elongated bird than the red-winged blackbird. It has a longer, slightly de-curved bill and longer tail. It also has longer legs meant for foraging on the ground.

Activity 2:   Hello from north Florida.  I used Merlin to identify a black and white warbler and a downy woodpecker. Hairy woodpeckers also visit my feeders & was surprised that the Merlin app didn’t suggest them as an option when I entered colors (black, white, red) and a larger size. Any suggestions ?

Activity 1: I have been trying to sort in my own mind how to tell these three shorebirds apart, so yesterday I went out with my camera to an empty beach at 7:00 in the morning.   Their body shape and coloring look pretty similar to my untrained eye, at least from a distance.  Their bills are distinctively different, the Whimbrel's is curved down, the Willit's is much shorter and the Godwit's is longer with an apricot colored part.  The Willit is easy to identify when it is flying because it has a distinctive white band on it's wings, the Whimbrel has a stripe on it's head. Now I just have to remember which is which.

I tried to identify this small bird feeding from my finch food bag feeder this week. It is larger than the typical finches that feed there, so was curious. I assumed it is a sparrow of some type, but not sure which type. I used the Merlin app and it came up with two different possible matches when I used two different pictures. Either the Harris's Sparrow, which typically is found further north in Canada I think, or the Fox Sparrow. I am in Northeast Wisconsin.  Any other ideas?

Activity 3:  Today, May 1 in Greenwood Village, Colorado (suburb of Denver) I saw two white-crowned sparrows foraging for food in the grass beneath bird feeders containing black oil sunflower seeds.  I used Merlin for a positive ID.  Many Robins were searching the grass for worms.    (Can they hear the worms underground?!  How do they know they are there?)  Again, I used Merlin to determine male and female Robins.  Black-capped chickadees were eating from the sunflower seeds and the suet.  Enjoyed lots more bird action in the backyard today but I chose to profile those 3 food-finding activities.

A rose breasted grosbeak appeared on my feeder today here in north New Jersey. This is one of my favorite spring visitors who was very content to dine on some sunflower seeds.