A male Eastern rufous-sided towhee. About 7 inches.
Eileen and Paul Goldfinger. Blogfinger.net. Ocean Grove, NJ, Jersey Shore, USA.
This migrating bird showed up this morning in our backyard. The last time one of these visited us was in 2012.
We are “birders” but this was a rare sighting for us. So far this bird is on his own. Maybe he ran away from home singing “Fly Me to the Moon!”
Here’s a link about our birding adventures.
And this is our garden here in winter:
Blogfinger photo. 2022. The red “Etruscan Horse” is a metal sculpture by artist Jo Ubogy.
We do feed the birds, and this is a time of migration when unusual birds may show up, even for just a day.
Birding is great fun and educational for kids. We use squirrel resistant feeders filled with black oil sunflower seed obtained at The Hungry Puppy (They deliver.). We have a bird bath and some shrubs with berries. And our small pond with fish is another attraction.
We also place seed mixtures on the ground and suet cakes hanging around. It’s best to design your gardens with bird watching in mind.
One of the best sources of birding equipment is at Brock’s in Colt’s Neck near Delicious Orchard.
You can get an app called ‘Merlin Bird ID” which listens for bird songs and identifies the species for you. Last week a large hawk was seen relaxing in Firemen’s Park. And shore birds like egrets can be seen in both lakes.
If you feed birds, and there are none around, check the trees for hawks and the shrubs for cats.
Ava Gardner. From “Showboat”. 1951