The week started with NO Japanese beetles being found and fingers crossed that their season had finally come to an end … it also started with a Bay-breasted Warbler in one of the Rowan trees. Good auguries for the week to come.
Monday produced Warbling Vireo, Magnolia and Black-throated Green Warblers and … a few more Japanese Beetles, so the Sunday excitement was just wishful thinking. Number greatly diminished though.
Tuesday – Northern Parula flitting between Rowan and Birch trees, quite a few juvenile American Goldfinches still demanding that their parents feed them … AMGOs do raise young later in the year than almost all the other birds, but this is September!
A group of Cedar Waxwings visited, some having a bath in the waterfall pool. We added more Black and White Warblers, a single Pine Warbler (yay!), a female Indigo Bunting, juvenile Purple Finches, a gang of five Blue Jays, a couple of American Redstarts and a Baltimore Oriole.
Wednesday topped that list of passing birds with a brief sighting of a Wilson’s Warbler in the Birch trees plus very short visits by a Cape May Warbler and a Nashville. Some Grackles descended on the feeders but not the great hordes we have enjoyed here some years – possibly because the garden is more overgrown these days or because they don’t like the new location for the feeders? More Cedar Waxwings.
Midweek was noticeable for a more sustained absence of Japanese Beetles – temperatures have been down quite a bit these past days and JBs don’t fly much, if at all, in temperatures below 21C.
In the past couple of days a troop of four or more juvenile Northern Cardinals have been prominent. We are used to juveniles with their parents but late-season teenage gangs is new here.
Two-spotted Bumble Bee … note the “Trump” style yellow haircut 😉
Some of you may have seen the mid-week post in our other blog (http://www.greenbirding.ca/sunflower-bees/) about the bird-planted, volunteer sunflower and a pair of big bees sitting on it.. When we took the photos, one bee was rather still and the other truffling around lethargically … subsequent to that post (do read it) we noticed a couple of days after that the bees were still on the flower. Very dead. The bee species we identified them as belonging to – see the link above – is one that “closes down” for the winter earlier than many others and we assume they had succumbed to the cold weather. So long as there are queens to overwinter.
The Canna lilies which the Hummingbirds make good use of, have been shorter than previous years by quite a bit. Weather effect?
I have a washtub I’d like to turn into a pond with fall (or sprinkler). You have obviously given a lot of thought to your water feature. Is it feasible to use my big tub with a sunken ‘table’ for the birds to bathe?
Any idea are very welcome.
I don’t see why not … try to have a pump to circulate water and keep it moving, that will stop mosquitoes and “help” a bit with controlling algae.