A Gardeners Forum Forums Gardening Reference Gardening in 2006 Another mystery bird.....

Another unidentified bird...2 in a 2 day period...WOW......

Anyone know what this is...sorry the picture isn't great again....I can't get too close or they fly away.





That fine looking birdfeeder was a gift from Cindy for guessing Lolas middle name...it has a matching birdhouse that I have in that tree too.

Looks like a brown-headed cowbird and looks like you aren't the only one to see one! Check out Thorny\'s reply here.

Here's a link.

Wow, that looks just like it....thanks Mel...2 mystery birds in 2 days...I just think it's fantastic!!!!

How come I have never seen one of those birds at my feeders?

I don't have Cowbirds at my feeders either, Cindy, but they are in the neighbor's yard juswt 30 feet from my feeders ALL the time. Cowbirds are fickle (and SATANIC )

Why don't you like them Thorny????

I think I just saw a catbird.......never noticed them around here either.....this has been a heck of a past few days for new bird sightings here.

Cowbirds do NOT build a nest OR raise their own young. A female Cowbird finds the nest of some other species of bird and removes one egg and lays one of her own to replace it. The unsuspecting Cardinal or Warbler or whatever then raises the Cowbird chick as one of her own. often the baby Cowbirds KICK the other babies out of the nest until only they remain ! Many endangered birds have their numbers further reduced by this Cowbird behavior. Google Cowbird Behavior to learn more about this destructive behavior.

Here are some Brown-Headed Cowbird Males I took a picture of in my neighbor's yard.

SEE! They really are brown!

Well that's not very nice of them. :p :p

Well...I went outside awhile ago and look what was at my feeder...and the entire maple tree was full of them!

wow- they sure are popping up a lot now that spring has finally sprung huh? yea- i had heard about their behavior and wasn't so thrilled with it, but nature is nature i suppose.

Brown-Headed Cowbirds are in most of the Eastern US all year but spread out in the Fall/Winter. In spring?Summer they cluster together in large groupd for mating and nest-stealing and then disperse.

The ones with gun-metal blue bodies and brown heads are males, Cindy. The ALL greyish/brown birds are the evil, fiendish females. (But they're cute)

Most of us evil, fiendish females are kinda cute!

LOL- yup!

Last year in my garden we had a little chipping sparrow feeding a Brown headed cowbird.The baby cowbird was twice the size of the "parent" feeding it.It did look like an over worked "Mom"
Dave