Snowmagedon

Here Birdie, Birdie!
The snowbirds make their appearance!
I wasn't sure what this was, but he was eating thistle seeds, of course, he is a gold finch in his winter colors! Beautiful!

The weatherman/women have been yapping about it for days, the biggest snowstorm of the the season was headed our way. Store shelves were emptied of bread, milk, and meat, kids were praying for snow days, and radar images scared us all.

The local NBC station yapped on all day long about the storm, yes, it is coming, yes, it will be here soon, yes, see the poor reporter standing out in the cold for 8 hours straight, waiting, waiting.....

The kids got their snow day, the reporters finally had something to measure, but the snow really didn't make its impact on our area. Now, 50 miles west of St. Louis, they closed down the entire interstate 70 all across Missouri. I got my snow day, and spent it absolutely doing nothing of importance!

But, one of my FB friends is making a habit of photographing birds in his backyard, and he is really good at it. It inspired me to photograph birds also, but there were none around for me to photograph. So I got some bird feeders, and put them out today.

Within 10 minutes, the first snowbird (slate colored junco)found the offering, and before long, he had communicated to his fellow snowbirds the bounty he found. I had lots of subjects to photograph.

I also bought a finch feeder. I know I've seen house finches in the neighborhood (the ones with the rosy heads). At times, I've seen goldfinches, but not often. I looked out and there on the finch feeder was a goldfinch. At first, I couldn't figure out what kind of bird it was, but the black and white wings were a tip off--it was a gold finch in its drab brown winter coat! Later the house finch showed up, but wouldn't cooperate to get into my viewfinder before he flew off.

So, I'm happy with the day's work. I got my pictures downloaded, which sounds easy, but I had used equipment in the past that is no longer in use to download, so I had to reinvent that whole process. I'm definitely interested in continuing this process, and hope to see many more feathered friends enjoying the bird feeders.