I was driving home from shopping tuesday and saw my first turkey vulture of the year!!

Thursday I saw red-winged blackbirds across the street!!!
Spring IS coming!!

What migratory birds are telling you it's spring??
Please add pics if you have them. I want to hear your stories.

My second Red-Bellied Woodpecker at my feeders in the five years since I've lived here. Last night, at 3:00 AM I could hear a Robin singing its Springtime song. A Song Sparrow and an American Goldfinch were both at my feeders which is fairly rare for my feeders although BOTH species are ABUNDANTLY numerous in my neighborhood. The Common Grackles have returned. No ACTUAL migrants yet. They are still about three weeks away, but Springtime activities and behavior have begun.

Cool Thorny!!!!

I know it's spring because the Starlings are nesting in my birdhouse.....this is the time of year I watch them sitting in there with their heads poking out.

I saw 2 cardinals the other day, and I swear I didn't see any all winter long....I thought they stuck around through the winter?

I can tell it's getting closer to spring because the whole backyard is filled with birds of different types. During the winter we had a decent amount of birds but it was mostly just 3 different kind. As much as I hate the hot weather it will be nice to be able to start planting again soon ^.^.

Loz Cardinals do stay all year. They must have been at the neighbors

I guess so.....I seriously never saw any all winter!

The birds know spring is coming, they are out there chirping up a storm right now!

Not much longer before I'll be able to put my window feeder back in!

I have three Cardinals in my yard, along with a Female Red-Bellied Woodpecker (a first for this yard), a male and female Downy Woodpecker together (mated Pair, YAY, babies soon), 10 Grackles (both sexes) and the Usual Suspects.

I had several Cardinals, a Downy Woodpecker and my resident mockingbird in my yard today, along with all my other regulars and like Thorny...

Thorny, do you have any suggestions on how to get rid of the Grackles? Sometimes my yard look like a scene from "The Birds"!

Patti, me too. In early spring I get grackles with starlings and red winged blackbirds! Aaaaaah!
My last house I had a big flock of redwings one spring. What a sight when they all took off at once!

I have a few redwings but I'd gladly trade with y'all--you take some these nasty, evil cow birds! I hate the little beasties :p Besides what they do the to songbirds nesting efforts, they absolutely take over my bird feeders I've been enjoying Baltimore orios, cardinals, doves, bluebirds, etc. all winter but the nasty cowbirds have returned in their usual massive numbers.

Marleine, I'm going to try to attract some of the Baltimore Oriels again this year by getting a new feeder. because I live in the city and there is just too much traffic near my house. I would love to have them.

every year we can tell spring is coming cause the aleutian geese migrate back to the area

Wrennie,
Do you see them often, and know much about them?

We have a flock of them, *anywhere's between 25~40 in the backyard at my mother's house.
*right next door*
We stand and watch them swoop in here, glide like eagles..
They have several nests in the back property..

Can't get rid of Grackles. Just put out enough food for the Grackles and the other birds. Just get a good camera and get lots of pics of the Grackles, they are one BEAUTIFUL bird.

Oh, Thorny, I would definitely agree , IF, and only if, I just had ONE grackle in my yard!!! Actually, I would enjoy having ONE BEAUTIFUL grackle in my yard.

Grackle for Patches

Thanks, Thorny , but that's four Grackles, so it's THREE more than I really wanted . Those are really some wonderful pictures! Actually, Grackles are beautiful birds and I love all birds even the Grackles. Geesh, they are the ones who seem to enjoy my home-made suet cakes them most, so they must like my cooking ! It's just sometimes there are soooo many it's overwhelming!!!

I see alot in the warmer months.
What do you want to know about them??

My white throated sparrows are back! We watched them around the feeders last evening.
Now when my chippys {chipping sparrows, not chipmunks} are back I know its going to get warm!
I had 1 grackle with2 redwings in my yard. Then they went to the top of the sycamore across the street. There were only about 7 up there. When more come back it will sound like an school cafeteria up there! I hope I have a working camera, maybe even with a zoom by then.

***UPDATE***
I just went to the kitchen sink and there were 7 grackle and 3 redwings under the feeder.

Well, lets' see... we had a load of them show up about 7 years now...
And at first we only saw them circling up wayyy high.. *almost scared me cause I thought there was a de@d body somewhere's...

The local bird guy needs to do some research... :rolleyes:
A turkey vulture used to be refered to as a turkey buzzard. With reclassifications it is now the vulture. Same bird. New era different name. It was believed they were raptors & related to hawks, but its discovered they really arent and are related to ibises & storks.
heres a better explanation
NOW the one thing I'm wondering is do you SEE nests in the trees? Because T.Vultures lay their eggs on the ground, on a ledge etc. Unless there was already someone elses nest there then maybe. They do perch in groups on tree tops tho.

No, I do not see nests, but didn't go under the tree's to actually look though...

They go to the trees' and the same time everynight, whether it's day light savin's time or not..(around 7:00pm)

And I've looked them up on the internet,
and have seen that picture, but just never can get a good look at them to see all that red..
Click here.. There\'s some pictures...t are the EXACT match of what\'s here...

I see them with the babies alll the time, and it looks like they're just learning to fly and we love watching them "TRY" to land in the tree tops, we're like, "Is he going to make it this time, nope, okay, one more try, come on maaaaaaaa, find a shorter tree.. or something..."
it's fun to watch them, they are absolutely majestic flying and landing.. *when they're older*

Mine never seem to look that red on the head either. Maybe its a breeding color

I've never seen a Turkey Vulture but those were some awesome pictures According to the map we have them in this area but I've never run across one.

We have tons of Turkey Vultures around here....saw one flying around a few weeks ago.

I counted SIX TV's today on the Interstate.

Six televisions on the interstate....interesting day you had !

I guess the tornadoes hit a day early?
Be careful today Thorny!

Actually birders abbreviate a lot of bird names because they can be SOOOOOO long. "TV's" are Turkey Vultures, but when I see TV I think Transvestite. I can just see a Vulture wearing a slinky red sequined evening gown and a pink feather boa, hunkered over the bloated corpse of a dead cow in the desert! "Yummy!" (Thorn flutters his wing tips)

Patches,
We never had bluebirds when we lived in the subdivision either. We are out in the country now and have 5 1/2 acres of yard with 5 acres up front between us and the road that we left wooded. The bluebirds just love it here and I love watching them. Plan to put up some houses for them this year (I hope :rolleyes: )

Marleine,

Of course, I guess it doesn't help that my back yard borders the church and school parking lot. Geesh, it sounds like your Bluebirds have a very nice home there just like it is, but I'm sure they'll welcome some houses to raise their babies.

we see the buzzards here all the time, but they usually have black heads. which isn't bad.

Your black headed vultures are Black Vultures, my favorite vulture.

We have quite a flock of buzzards around here. We live on a country road but folks fly on it and they tend to leave frequent "fast food dinners" for all the local buzzards . I always hate to see when a deer, coon or squirrel gets done it that way

Thorn looks up from the carcass of a road-kill something-or-other, His face and mouth all covered with gore and says, ""Scuse me? I didn't hear what you said, I was eatin' berfast!"

Eeeeeeeeeeeewwwwwwwwww!

Thorn holds up a dangly strip of sumthin' and says, "What the heck is this? Oh well, it'll fill my craw."

You're a hoot, Thorn

i saw 3 Blue Jays today ~

we saw something weird today. i'm trying to figure out how the armadillo got squished in the middle of a very long bridge but the black vultures had a nice meal out of it.

the ones here can pick a deer clean in just a couple of days, or less...

We saw snow!!! :p

Yeah, I saw snow flurries here today too, Weezie. Just looking at it made me cold. Of course, there were two Cardinals at one of the feeders off and on all afternoon.

We saw snow! Lots of it!

We got about 5",
But we were on the tail side of it..
How much did you end up getting "this spring day"???

Yep Wrennie, looks like my house! Sure is hard to think of spring when you are out shoveling snow. I can't wait to get my fountain back up and my seeds started! We can only hope that it warms up and it melts. I don't mind winter but this storm should have happened back in December!

My thoughts exactly..
I dislike winter, but I'd rather have winter when it's supposed to be winter, and not when it's supposed to be spring and I'm wanting to start seeds in the greenhouse...
But it is only March still, so, I am banking on one more month of this stuff...

The night of the storm, I was at a friend's house for dinner and my thought as I looked out the window was "This would be beautiful for December" and felt like I should be decorating a tree!

The birds KNOW it's spring today!

So far this morning I've had a house finch, 2 mockingbirds(first of the year), 2 cardinals, and 2 blue jays(first of the year)!