Bioscape Farm

#1 Where we live, this time of year we can easily identify Piliated Woodpeckers from all other birds due to it's shape. And we also have sandhill cranes that nest on our property that are very distinctive to anything else here. #2 At our feeder we get dark-eyed juncos, black-capped chickadees, and white-crowed sparrows that each have black, white and brown parts, but their colour patterns are very different from one another, which aids in identification. #3 The Ravens fly over our farm and scan the ground for anything to eat. Again the piliated woodpecker we saw ripping an old tree apart looking for food. The tree swallows are very active, flying overhead searching and eating insects in the air. And our pair of mallards on the pond peacefully bob up and down for food. #4 Not our favourite bird, but, we recently had a huge wind storm that must have pushed north some Bullock's Orioles. We had one at our feeder by the house and it confused us because it looked like a western tanager, which we get here, but the colour patterns were not quite the same. And the body share was definitely different. We didn't have Merlin yet, but the maps in our Sibley guide showed that the Bullock's came close to our location. So I asked a bird expert friend of mine, and even though it is rare for the bird to be here, it likely was. And since then, there have been other sightings, so our ID was confirmed.