What are those birds doing?

My camera sees what my eyes can't see!

In the big trees on the east side of the ranch house I have two hanging feeders with black oil sunflowers seeds, three feeders made for thistle seed, two platform feeders that I put both sunflower seeds and thistle seeds in, two hummingbird feeders stocked with sugar water, and one suet holder. By having having different feeders I can attract lots of kinds of birds.

Since I got my Cannon single-lens reflex digital camera I have from time to time set up my camera on a tripod, aimed it at a feeder and taken pictures. The wonderful advantage to digital cameras is that you can take hundreds of pictures and delete all the ones that don't show anything special. This week my blog shows pictures of interactions of birds which shows activities and details that I can't see because it is happening so fast that my eyes can't see the action.

Of course I don't know what the birds are really saying to each other, but it is fun to make up captions for them.

Hey, I was here first!
These birds are Pine Siskins that have markings that look like sparrows, but is actually in the same group as Goldfinches. They have yellow markings on their wings and tail (the yellow doesn't show up in these photos). They like thistle seed and in this picture are on a sock thistle feeder. Because there are lots of individuals they are frequently jostling for spots.

It's mine, keep away!

Why don't you look where you're going?

There is room for everybody, we just have to figure out where.

You all are too rude, I'm out of here!

Last summer when there were hoards of hummingbirds hanging around the hummingbird feeders, I set up my camera and took some shots of their activities. Below is one of them.

This little male Black-chinned Hummingbird is either landing, or possibly he is leaving (hummingbirds are like helicopters, and can fly forward, backward, up and down).

Chris Johnson took this wonderful picture of a female Black-chinned Hummingbird while visiting during the summer.

Thanks to Chris Johnson for the picture above.
Other pictures taken by Margaret Bamberger