Tuesday, June 23, 2015

Kildeer

Photos by Mrs. Frank


A few months ago my mom's friend texted her these photos and asked me to identify this bird. She had found this bird and these eggs at the park where her son plays baseball. This is a killdeer. Killdeer pretend they have a broken wing when they feel threatened. Their eggs have this appearance so that they blend in with rocks.

I recommend using the Merlin Bird ID app. It helps you identify birds. It asks you questions about what you saw and then it says what it could be.

- Birder Troy

Thursday, June 18, 2015

How I Became a Fledgling Birder

Welcome to my blog!

This is a picture of me last summer when I was 8 and staying at my grandma's (AKA Grandma Barb's) house in Wisconsin. My grandma has a garage and a fence separating her backyard and her neighbor's. As you can see, on the fence there are two nesting boxes. These were apparently used by several house sparrows. One day, as I sat outside waiting for some house sparrows to come on in and feel comfortable going in their boxes with me right there, I started to become very interested in ornithology. In case you're wondering, ornithology is the study of birds.

I had a feeling the house sparrows wouldn't come because they were scared of me and hadn't seen me there before. One went to my grandma's safflower feeder, took a seed, swiveled his head, and looked up. I had no idea what he was looking at, so I looked up too. I could see nothing. I shrugged and said to myself, "Maybe I should move away, but I want to be close. How can I do both?" I knew it was physically impossible to do both. I was never able to get close to those sparrows, but I watched them fly in and out during my whole visit in Wisconsin.

That first day when I was observing the house sparrows, I was about to give up on watching them when I noticed a flash of yellow. As I slowly turned to my grandmother's green bean garden, I laid eyes on my first American goldfinch.

That was the day I noticed what it was like to be a fledgling. A fledgling is a baby bird, and fledgling can also be used to describe someone who is new at something. I am still a fledgling when it comes to birding, but I am now growing flight feathers. I go on bird walks and to bird talks (hey, that rhymes!), I have 7 bird feeders at my house now, and I read about birds all the time. Finally, I like to teach people about birds, and that is mostly the reason for this blog that you are reading.

Thank you to my former teacher, Mrs. Yollis, for helping me with this blog and for teaching me about blogging.

Are you interested in birds?
I wonder what my readers would like to ask me to blog about?

*Kids, don't post your full name or exactly where you (or I) live.*

Nice having you here reading this!

P.S. My other posts won't be as long as this one.

P.P.S. In my About Me section, I mention wood ducks. Here is a video of baby wood ducks jumping out of the nest. This is not at 30 feet. It's more like 6 feet, I think.