What is your favorite bird? And every fowl encounter you've had under the sun

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It sits so low in the water.Do you have grebes? Are the two related?
 
We do have grebes though they’re not common in the desert. They’re closely related to loons, though their feet are lobed and not webbed.

Here’s a Western Grebe from last winter.

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And here’s the loon saying goodbye.

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When did you start getting so interested in God’s Feathered ones? You seem to have quite the passion and years of experience under your belt?
 
Don’t forget all you good folks now and then to thank God for your good eye sight. I have never taken a huge interest in spotting birds mainly because my vision only corrects to 20 / 40 which makes it hard to pick out details at a distance, like spotting birds at all. But I’m getting an awesome look just from this thread.

Oh, and I still have to look at the webcam for ospreys, if anyone remembers the web address, please post it again.
 
I’ve composed a little speech that I’d like everyone to here. Well, it’s not mandatory but still…

 
I thought I heard something very similar to that on CNN, MSNBC and FOX last evening.
 
When I was in 8th grade my English teacher took us to a wildlife refuge. It was in the spring and all the ducks were paired up and in full breeding plumage. That’s when I really caught the bug.

For me, it’s a quality of life issue. I’m happiest when I’m around lots of birds They’re amazing creatures.

Here’s where it all began, Lee Metcalf NWR in Montana, though many years later and in a different season.
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I lived in Missoula for almost 10 years. Went to university there
 
That just raised your cool factor substantially.

Here’s a Townsend’s Solitaire on the U of M campus. I just woke him up.(Please Note: This uploaded content is no longer available.)
 
Does it take much time before a novice become proficient at quickly identifying birds he / she sees?
 
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Not too long. It’s easy to start to sort out the different families with a good bird guide. After that it’s nuances in shape, behavior, habitat, etc. The thing to do is to learn whats locally common, get good at identifying them, then when anything different shows up it’s easy to tell.

The two friends I helped to teach how to bird became better than me very quickly.
 
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Once you do get the basic families down some genus’s of birds can be tricky. One of the most notorious of these are the Empidonax flycatchers. I have found the following chart very useful in sorting them all out.

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Here’s a Spruce Grouse in Montana. I found her while hiking to the top of Ch-paa-qn peak.

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Very nice 🙂 In the paddocks around where I live we have quail…soon as it’s Autumn there will be shooters come from the city, the Greeks and Italians like to hunt them .Followed by duck season

(Nice as in a lovely bird,a sweet face.)
 
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They are dumb as chickens, though. They really scared me one night when I was hiking in the dark. All of a sudden, I heard what sounded like something between a helicopter, 100 galloping horses, and a machine gun. It was a startled grouse, flying away. They make quite a racket! I had no idea what the noise was at the time.
 
JamalChristophr said:
Don’t forget all you good folks now and then to thank God for your good eye sight. I have never taken a huge interest in spotting birds mainly because my vision only corrects to 20 / 40 which makes it hard to pick out details at a distance, like spotting birds at all. But I’m getting an awesome look just from this thread.

Oh, and I still have to look at the webcam for ospreys, if anyone remembers the web address, please post it again.
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Hi @JamalChristophr,

I’m the one who posted the Cornell University Orthnithology birdie webcams here for everyone to look at…


They have an Osprey cam. this year at the Skidaway Audubon Site that had Great Horned Owls nesting there last time. It was originally an Eagle’s nest first–that’s why it’s so large.

The Ospreys are nesting there now.

The nest was empty for quite awhile after the owls had nested there. I was watching it when the owls were there with their little ones.

It looked like different birds were checking it out for a nesting site, but none stayed until this pair of Ospreys that are currently in it.

The nest is located in a dead tree high up, in Savannah, GA.

Editing to add that I was reading over at the Osprey web cam site, and Mommy Osprey is nesting on three eggs! 😁 ❤️ 🐤

The most recent egg was just laid yesterday! 🐤
 
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Thanks. I’m looking now and just bookmarked it!!

Ahh, such a great view and my kin look quite relaxed and comfy with the other birds singing in the background.
 
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You’re welcome! 😀

I’ve been looking at the various bird cams., including the Osprey cam. over the past few weeks.

It’s so soothing to me, to watch them. I enjoy watching bird cams. 🙂

Basically they were guarding their nesting site and were working on building up the nest then. The female hadn’t laid any eggs yet when I first started watching.
 
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