We've had some terrific diaries here on Dawn Chorus that have shown us raptors, waterfowl, habitat and much more. But I'm going to be a little more mundane here this morning and talk a bit about birds that some people might call "ordinary." And I mean ordinary in the sense that they're so common, people often don't give them their due. Follow me over the fold while I share some of my pals with you and invite you to do the same.
But first, a bit of housekeeping. While Lineatus is taking a well-deserved break, Dawn Chorus will rotate among guest hosts (kudos to Julie & Cardinal thus far), of whom Lineatus will still occasionally be one (see next week and the second half of August.) Note that on the schedule below, "Julie/Open" means that Julie will take the reins unless you want to claim "Open" for yourself and slot your name in. If you do want to volunteer for a slot, please respond to the tip jar and say so. Dawn Chorus is posted on Sunday mornings, 9am ET / 6am PT. Please plan to post on or near this time if you volunteer for a slot. The current schedule is:
* Jun 20: Lineatus
* Jun 27: Julie/Open
* Jul 4: Julie
* Jul 11: Kestrel
* Jul 18: matching mole
* Jul 25: Julie/Open
* Aug 1: matching mole
* Aug 8: Kestrel
* Aug 15: Lineatus
* Aug 22: Lineatus
* Aug 29: Lineatus
With that out of the way, let's talk a bit about common birds, the birds you perhaps see every day but don't give a lot of thought to. Especially to people not into birding, those might include pigeons and crows and sparrows. (I don't know about you, but to my non-birding friends, anything not a pigeon or crow is a sparrow.) And while there are lots of birds common throughout the U.S., there are a number of birds that may be common to your habitat, but not mine, and vice-versa. I hope those of you not in the U.S. will chime in and share what some of yours are, too. Here are some of my everyday denizens:
Oak Titmouse
Chestnut-backed Chickadee
I'm on the West Coast, specifically in Northern California. Chestnut-backed chickadees and oak titmouses are very common here. Do you have these? Or perhaps your area has the more common black-capped variety of chickadee or the tufted titmouse. Or maybe the black-crested titmouse if you're in central or south Texas?
Another common backyard pal for me is the dark-eyed junco, in particular the one below, the Oregon junco.
Dark-eyed (Oregon) Junco
There are several subspecies of dark-eyed juncos and they actually do belong to the emberzine family of sparrows, as do the towhees. But these distinctions are lost on the everything-is-a-sparrow crowd, so I don't bring this up. You'll notice that this junco has a black cap, which tells us he's male, while the female sports a gray cap. All of the juncos have white outer tail feathers that make them very easy to identify, especially when they take off in flight.
Next among the most common backyard birds here is this handsome character who would trade his tail feathers for a peanut, the ubiquitous Western scrub jay. More on him and his cousin, the Steller's jay, in a minute.
Western Scrub Jay
Now we come to the spotted towhee, not a great picture here, but those of you in the east will recognize this bird as looking exactly like that common bird you have, the Eastern towhee -- except this one is spotted.
Spotted Towhee
If you look at the range map for towhees, you'll see that the country is divided right down the middle -- all lands west of Kansas are spotted towhees and all east are Eastern towhees, with some intermingling. We also have a California towhee here -- I don't have a picture, but it's an all-brown version of this medium-sized, ground-feeding bird. An interesting tidbit on behavior of the spotted towhee -- they use the "double scratch" method of kicking both feet backward simultaneously to expose food. The California towhee doesn't do this. In very low light, when I look out at my feeders and see movement on the ground, this is how I can distinguish the spotted towhee from anybody else out there. It's very distinctive.
Next up is the downy woodpecker. I'll do more on woodpeckers in a future Dawn Chorus, but include this resident here just to note that it's among the most common of my backyard birds. If you're a drop-in Kossack here just looking at pictures on a Sunday morning and you think woodpeckers are cool, you can attract them with suet feeders. Come back for another diary on woodpeckers and I'll tell you more.
Downy Woodpecker
This next visitor is a Steller's jay. Here on the West Coast, most everyone calls our most common jay (the Western scrub) a blue jay. It's not. We don't have blue jays on the West Coast. We have scrub jays and Steller's jays. Here's the Steller's.
Steller's Jay
The Western scrub jay shown earlier is actually in a different genus than the blue jay. But the Steller's jay above is, in fact, in the same genus as the blue jay. (Both have that head-crest thing going on that links them.) Both the Steller's and the Western scrub jays are large, loud and aggressive. If you've got food, they want it. A few years back, I made a bacon and egg breakfast and served it outside on the deck -- I came inside for a napkin and before I got back to the table, a Steller's jay had landed and poked a hole in my sunny-side-up egg, leaving it oozing.
Next we have some American goldfinches -- they love them some nyjer seed, as you can see.
American Goldfinches
I love goldfinches. Don't we all? That bright yellow body is always a wonder to behold. It's always a renewing moment whenever they appear. My father passed away a few years back and due to the ravages of Alzheimer's, he was completely incapacitated and incoherent. But the goldfinches at the feeder were bright enough to catch his eye, and I could see him register their presence.
Next we have a golden-crowned sparrow. They've moved on now, but lord-a-mercy, how they fatten-up waiting to migrate. This one looks barely able to lift off.
The Fattest Golden-crowned Sparrow Ever
And here's another Western scrub jay shot --helping itself to some nest-building material -- before taking off for parts unknown.
Thieving Western Scrub Jay
These are just some of the backyard birds I see most every day at my feeders here in Northern California. To me, these birds are extraordinary because they're so very ordinary -- they're an every day pleasure. They're also joined by many house finches (wonderful songbirds), white-breasted nuthatches, sparrows, mourning doves, robins and others who make each day a little more special.
Depending on where you are, your "ordinary" bird is probably pretty special to somebody else who doesn't have them. Case in point -- cardinals. We Left Coasters don't have them. And those of you in Texas and other parts East get to see painted buntings, a bird I'd love to see that's wholly absent in these parts.
So, tell your other Dawn Chorus readers here . . . what geography are you in and who are your every-day denizens?