Project Feeder Watch

[farmaholic]

Whoa, that's quite the visitor! A cougar, i presume?

Lynx?

[dalek]

There’s a store here dedicated to bird feeding. Nothing but feeders and gourmet bird feed, even custom mix. Toronto people seem to love it

[burnt]

The lady of the house here draws a nice variety of birds with numerous feeders around the yard. We have a lot of mixed trees around our buildings, providing plenty of bird habitat.

Jays, some cardinals, tons of chickadees, the usual sparrows, Nuthatches, cedar Waxwings, finches of many sorts, among others.

But the most unusual was in the very harsh winter of 2015 when these guys showed up on our front porch one day. The snow was deep enough that they walked level onto our porch and stood right outside the front door, cleaning up sunflower seeds that the jays kicked out.



Maybe they were coming back for a visit after I came upon them while moving the cows the previous summer:

[woodland]

Whoa, that's quite the visitor! A cougar, i presume?

We had cougars a few years ago and they took down a weaned calf. The paw prints were bigger than my whole hand. The coyotes wouldn’t touch the carcass afterwards even. They’re bigger with shorter tan coloured fur than this guy.

[woodland]

Lynx?

That’s what I figure it is. He’s been spotted a few times by others in the area. Quite impressive to see these big cats run............ as long as it’s away from you😉

[Blaithin]

Got the barn site set up yesterday. There’s usually lots of birds around because of the bales so I’ll probably end up with more out there than at the house!

This morning there was some happy Chickadees at the feeders and the flock of House Sparrows on the ground.

I’ve got three small piles of barley silage at the base of the trees. On this side so the cows don’t think it’s worth trying to stretch through the fence for! Sprinkled some BOSS on top this morning just for extra yums. Probably have to take some binoculars to the barn so I can count and see what’s all there.

[woodland]

Got the barn site set up yesterday. There’s usually lots of birds around because of the bales so I’ll probably end up with more out there than at the house!

This morning there was some happy Chickadees at the feeders and the flock of House Sparrows on the ground.

I’ve got three small piles of barley silage at the base of the trees. On this side so the cows don’t think it’s worth trying to stretch through the fence for! Sprinkled some BOSS on top this morning just for extra yums. Probably have to take some binoculars to the barn so I can count and see what’s all there.

What exactly is BOSS?

[Blaithin]

Black Oil Sunflower Seeds.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

What exactly is BOSS?

There is, or was an ivermectin type product called Boss, I assumed she was trying to deworm the birds.

[the big wheel]

Use boss synthetic engine oil so was wondering also. Lol

[Blaithin]

Nope, different kind of BOSS. Although I do give it to the dairy cows if and when they need a boost.

[Blaithin]

Started my counts yesterday. To nobody’s surprise my highest counters are pesty species. But I had some Red Polls show up today so hopefully more variety is on its way!

Made a scoreboard to count on. It’s a list of the common ones I’ve seen other years.


And hodge podged together an attempt at something to put suet and bark butter in. So far haven’t seen any birds at it but the dog sure loves it!