Temperatures are chilly in northern AR today - didn't get above 32 and a
skiff of snow with a bit of sleet adding to the chill. We had the usual
birds (chickadees, cardinals, goldfinches, Carolina wrens, titmice, etc.)
going through double the normal amount of seeds at the feeder. Yesterday and
today a robin decided to add seed to its diet.

Seeing a robin eating seed on a platform feeder was a first for me. It's
usual food must have become scarce in the chill so it decided to change
diet. It was so puffed up in the chill that it appeared twice its normal
size.

John
"Noctaire" wrote in message
...
Well, we can't do too terrible much in the garden at the moment -- Mother
Nature is dropping ice on us and has been since yesterday evening. So we
decided to play with the birdies.

With the trees being leafless, we have half a dozen feeders up. The
Redbud
has a suet box and a tube feeder with sunflower seeds, the Crab Apple has
a
suet box and a tube feeder with nuts. We put a house type feeder up in
the
Black Walnut -- suet cakes on the sides and about 2 liters of mixed foods
that come out the front & back slot. We also have a tube with thistle for
Finches as well as a small house-type feeder, both on plant hooks that are
on either side of the walkway (these are where we typically hang the
Fuchsia
or other such basket plants). Since we've been attracting a number of
ground feeders, we spread a generous bit of all types of foods on the
ground
and even set a little bin up with a few piles. (There's no telling what
will pop up out of the ground this spring.)

Bearing in mind that we live in the city, street in front of our house
sees
about 60,000+ cars a day and the property abuts the street with only about
30 feet to the fence, we've picked up quite a selection of birds. Zone 6,
Cincinnati, Ohio -- here's the list so far:

Dove
Robin
Canary/Finch
Nuthatch
Chickadee
Sparrows (various types)
Starling
Downy Woodpecker (Breeding pair)
Cardinal
Carolina Wren

For most we have both male and female varieties, the Cardinals seem to be
REALLY prevalent (must be a ton of 'em out of there). We had a Blue Jay
as
well, but he hasn't been back in about 2 weeks that we've seen so I don't
know what happened to him. With all the ice we've been getting, the birds
have been hitting us particularly hard -- at this rate, we'll be tapped
for
bird foodstuffs in a few days. Hopefully things will clear up with the
weather soon, although we're not holding our breath -- according to the
weatherman, we're looking at anywhere up to 8 inches of snow overnight
now.

Now that we see just how much bird life there really is in this area
(surprising actually) we're looking at adding some additional plantings to
the property. First thing is to get some shrubs going that will grow
quickly and provide berries for them, second is to put some new trees
up --
probably some mulberry trees to complement those that are already out
back.
We'll be adding some additional feeders in the back as well as a water
source this spring.

No gardening yet, but lots of plans.

James