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The Suberb Lyrebird is known for its incredible adeptness towards mimicry. Its songs can be a mixture of not only other bird songs, but of any sound that it hears in its surroundings.
Watch the video below to see David Attenborough following a Superb Lyrebird which immitates a Kookuburra, a camera shutter, a chainsaw, and a car alarm
Everybody dance!
Come on! Get up and rock to this video! You know you want to!
Did you do it?? Do it!!!
Yes! Don't you feel much better now?
Here's another video of a Lyrebird performing a variety of sounds.
The bird is hard to see, but the sounds come in very clearly.
Congratulations to the St. Louis Cardinals for overcoming adversity and winning the World Series in an impressive fashion.
So, what are Cardinals around the world doing in celebration?
Fluttering around in some water of course!
COMPLETE WITH HARD-CORE MUSIC!!! ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!
Absolutely brilliant
You'll never guess who wins!
Since moving into my house about a year ago I've noticed that despite backing into the woods, my house is somewhat devoid of wildlife. A couple of days ago a spotted a male bluebird flying through my backyard.
In an attempt to lure the bluebirds to take residence at my house, I've setup a bluebird box.
The setup is pretty simple. The bluebird box was purchased from Lowes for $12.99. For the pole, I used 10 foot section of 3/4" black iron pipe. I cut off 2 feet of the pipe leaving 8 feet. To mount the box to the pole, I drilled two holes into the top of the pole and screwed the box into these holes. For stability, I buried two feet of the pole into the dirt, leaving the box sitting about 6 feet off the ground.
They say that you should point the entrance to the box away from prevailing winds, but winds seem to circle in all directions in my backyard; so I pointed the box toward my house so I can watch from any window.
To make the area even more enticing, I purchased the lovely birdbath shown above. This was from home depot. The base and bowl are sold as separate pieces, I think it ran about $22 for both. Don't ask me how I'm going to clean it; each piece ways about 50 pounds.
It's been almost three weeks since I put up my bluebird box. It's a little early, but still no activity.
To make the area a little more bird friendly, I put up a bird feeder. Because I'm new to the backyard birding world, I decided to take the cheap route first. The feeder you see below was around $4 from Home Depot. The pole was another $10.
After just a few house, I've gotten a pretty good variety of birds. It was a very wet and rainy day today, so none of my picture turned out well. If the weather changes tomorrow, I'll post pictures of what I've been getting.
Lots of activity at the bird feeder over the past couple days. Here a picture of some of the highlights:
Chipping Sparrows
Tufted Titmouse
Unknown Wren
Carolina Chickadee
After almost three weeks , I finally have some activity. At the end of the day there was still nothing in the box, but this bluebird is definitely checking it out.
No sign of the female today.
Entering the box 2
Perched on top
Puffed up and checking out the area
After a few days of back and forth (and the female making an appearance), the bluebirds have decided to take the box and they've started to build.
Working together
Female gathering pine straw
Entering the house
Male and female posing
Another puffed male shot
Day 4 of building and the bluebirds have made good progress. Not sure how much longer they're going to take.
Female in construction
Partially completed nest
The bluebirds finished building their nest a few days ago. Today, while pulling out of the driveway before work, I notices that the male was back and hanging around the hole to the bird box.
I got back late today to a nice surprise.
Finished nest
First egg
From hereon, they're supposed to lay one egg per day, up to five. I'll post with daily updates.
As expected, the second egg is here today. Update again tomorrow.
Egg number 2
Third bluebird egg
The fourth egg arrived sometime this morning.
Egg number four:
Per numerous resources I've read, eastern bluebirds will lay between 2-7 eggs in a clutch, one egg per day. This is going to be the last time I'll check the nest for a couple days. It's going to get cold over the next two days and I don't want to let a cold breeze in, so next time I check the box there could be up to another three eggs, or maybe just four.
This might be the last bluebird egg. The picture is from Monday, but the parents have become very protective since making me think that the Mom is incubating.
If I even get close to the box, the Dad swoops down over my head... which is a good thing, because I want them to be defending their box from potential predators.
Until they get comfortable with me, I won't be able to look in the box again.
But assuming this is the last egg, they're scheduled to hatch on the 28th.
Here's a very talented parrot seen on Pet Stars.
Oscar is a featherless cockatoo suffering from a condition in which her feathers irritate her skin, causing her to pull them out.
The bird is not up for adoption; however, the Humane Society where she is located is currently taking donations.
The eggs are set to hatch in about a week. The parents seem to be getting more and more used to me every day, but are still very protective. I managed to sneak a peek inside of the box and did confirm that they stopped at five eggs.
Here are some pictures of the mom and dad looking after their box:
Here's footage of a Golden Eagle picking up a goat and throwing it off of a cliff. Below is a picture of a pair of Golden Eagles from the Nashville Zoo.
In an answer to the beatboxing basset hound, here is the original beatboxing parrot.
Here are some more pictures of the bluebirds, this time perching on various trees around my backyard:
After 15 days of incubation, the Bluebirds finally hatched yesterday. Still blind and naked, it'll be about 12-14 more days until they're ready to leave the nest. I hope to be able to get into the box each day as these little guys become less and less bug-like.
Click here to follow the chronicle of this bluebird family.
The hatchlings are two days old now and the down is starting to fill in. As you can see, they've flipped over since yesterday. Their eyes still haven't opened.
You can also see that they're very hungry!
Click here to follow the chronicle of this bluebird family.
This bluebird hatchlings have arranged themselves now so that you can see all five of them.
It's good to see that all five are alive. They've faced some pretty cold weather in the mornings, but it's all passed now.
The bluebird hatchlings seem to be getting stronger and stronger each day. As expected, the parents are very busy, feeding their babies several times per hour.
Apparently eating every 15 minutes is not enough for these birds though:
Click here to follow the chronicle of this bluebird family.
