Tag Archive | birds calgary blog

Q & A: Follow-up on Attracting Birds to Feeders

Last May we answered a question from a reader who had been trying unsuccessfully to attract birds to her yard in Calgary. The yard was in an awkward location at a small townhouse without trees or shrubs. Although she was putting out many types of high-quality seeds, the birds were not coming. We gave some advice on attracting birds, which you can read about here. We are happy to report that after nearly a year of persistent effort, finally there are birds coming to the yard.

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Hi,

Nearly a year ago I approached you looking for suggestions on how to attract birds to my feeder in my awkward yard. While I was not successful last year, I’m happy to announce that my patience has finally paid off.

I thought I’d send you an update because others in a similar situation may find what I did will help them as well. When we got our Christmas tree (real) I kept the branches that were cut off the bottom, and was able to take a bunch more from other people’s trees as well. When I got home I bunched all the branches together and made several boughs out of them, tied them with wire, put a pretty bow on them and hung them from our balcony. Within 24 hours I had birds foraging through my boughs and feeding at my feeders!

The last month has been wonderful, I’m finally able to watch birds from my own window and I have a steady flock of Common Redpolls and finches that come throughout the day. I’m not sure what I’m going to replace the boughs with once they’re all dried up, but I’ll figure something out. I’ve attached a few photos just to demonstrate my situation and solution. I hope my experience may help someone else in the future.

Thanks again for all the suggestions, all the best.

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Here are the photos of her yard:

Sunday Showcase: Great Grays of Grand Valley Road

Mar10

Grand Valley Road northwest of Cochrane has been a really good place to find Great Gray Owls. Logan Gibson photographed this one while it was snowing on February 25:

On March 2, Brett Mahura found three different Great Grays on Grand Valley Road:

Furry Friday: Porcupine

Mar8

This North American Porcupine was spotted feeding on a Water Birch on the Inglewood Golf Course during the Calgary Christmas Bird Count on December 16, 2012.

Photo by Troy Bourque

Photo by Ian Neilson

Photo by Troy Bourque

Sunday Showcase: Bald Eagle Fledgling

Mar3

Rob English got these photos of a recently fledged Bald Eagle in Carburn Park in early August 2012. The bird had just recently left the nest across the river.

There was one of the adult eagles with this young one:

Sunday Showcase: Snow Bunting

Feb17

Michael Pott saw this Snow Bunting posing nicely on a fence post on Dunbow Road last week, just SE of the city. These birds are usually seen in here in the winter in large flocks, in open rural areas.

Leucistic Rough-legged Hawk

Feb16

Posted by Matthew Sim

We’ve done posts here on this blog about leucism before, which is when a bird has reduced pigmentation, meaning it has more white in it’s feathers than normal for the species. We’ve had some examples before, including a leucistic House Finch, American Robin, Ruby-throated Hummingbird and others. For the past few months, Calgary has had a very neat leucistic bird in the area. This Rough-legged Hawk frequents the area around Highway 40, just west of Calgary.

Leucistic Rough-legged Hawk

Now compare this with a more normal Rough-legged Hawk.

On January 1rst, I found this leucistic hawk on Highway 40 near its intersection with Range Road 40.

Furry Friday: Mink

Feb15

Rob English photographed this American Mink in April 2012 along the Bow River in Fish Creek Park, between the boat ramp and the highway 22X bridge.

Wednesday Wings: More Snowies!

Feb6

Snowy Owls photographed north of Strathmore in early January by Rob English.

Sunday Showcase: Female Rufous Hummingbird

Jan27

Photos taken by Rob English near Highwood House, SW of Calgary, in June 2012.

Here are a couple of shots of a male Rufous Hummingbird taken at the same time, to show the difference. For more of Rob’s photos of a male Rufous, see this post.