Winter Visitors.

It seems a bit too early to be posting about winter birds, but with the early snowfall and super low temperatures i've been having a lot of birds visiting my feeders looking for food.  i love feeding the birds, and keep feeders out year round.  Our favorites are the hummingbirds, and i'm a bit sad that we won't be seeing them again until next spring.

Each season seems to bring different birds, and in the winter we will sometimes get migrating birds that just pass through for a day or two. Our most common winter birds are tufted titmice, nuthatches, cardinals, bluejays, goldfinch, juncos and pine siskin.  Occasionally we've seen Baltimore Orioles, Rose breasted Grosbeak and waxwings. We like to make special treats for the birds in December, and  in February we participate in the The Great Backyard Bird count.

This year i've had several purple finch visiting, and a pair of cardinals beside the regular birds.

My husband and kids bought me this feeder for my birthday. Isn't it lovely?  That's a male purple finch hanging out on top, i believe.  They look very similar to house finch, but are a bit different.  You can compare them here.  My females definitely resemble the purple finch more than a house finch, although i don't have them in a picture.

 

 Yesterday i received quite a surprise when i looked out the door! There were about 20 of these birds all over my bird feeders.  i have three hanging feeders and a log cabin style feeder on a post.  At first glance i thought they were goldfinch because of the color, but then realized they were twice the size! 

Turns out they are Evening Grosbeak. This is the first time i have ever seen one! They have visited the feeders two days in a row now  (completely cleaned out all the sunflower seed) and i'm hoping they'll return again tomorrow.  Always exciting to see a new bird/butterfly/caterpillar etc that i've never seen before.  i think this weekend we'll make some birdseed cakes and see what other wonderful winter birds we can attract!