The Sunday BIRD Volume 8, Issue 23. November 25, 2012

Tuesday was a beautiful fall morning. The yard was quiet – no birds – as it has been this summer and so far this fall. As I walk out onto the back porch our resident hawk left from one of the upper branches of the oak... However once he left and I went back into the house the Blue Jays -- three I think – took advantage of the moment and took their daily bath...one at a time while the other stood guard in the tree.

190mm, f/6.3@1/640, ISO800



One more from an extensive series to make sure that in a post several weeks ago I didn't leave the impression that only Robins enjoy a bath ….

190mm, f/6.3@1/640, ISO 800



This is one of the gentler bath pictures, I have several showing much more vigorous activity but a less recognizable bird.

Later that morning we had other visitors, just taking a survey

300mm, f/8@1/1250, ISO 800



This is one of a pair. Later still more came by. Usually these Turkey Vultures fly over the yard too high to get a decent picture. Today they were coming in lower, probably trying to see if the hawks left any breakfast scraps for them. IMHO they are very beautiful birds in flight, not so attractive when seen sitting in a tree or on the ground....

FWIW ..I have noticed that my yard birds have developed a new pattern. For a couple years now we've had about two dozen finches that sat in our bushes nearly constantly mainly going between feeder and sunning themselves while the other yard birds were going and coming at their leisure. This year our increased hawk population seems to have changed that pattern. Now the finches are fewer and they usually show up during short windows of time when the hawks seem to be elsewhere. The cardinals, blue jays and woodpeckers also all appear in that ten or fifteen minute window and then all are gone until the next window. …. A neighbor informed us that our squirrel population decreased by one as they watched a hawk in their backyard leisurely consuming one (he took over two hours they said.) I assume that we now have a red tailed hawk patrolling the area although I don't think I've seen him lately. Possibly this is what is enticing the vultures to take a closer look.