Backyard Birding (2023) | Hacker News Reader

Backyard Birding (2023)

worldsensorium.com

68 pointsdnetesn15 comments

> By cultivating a bird-friendly environment, we not only nurture local populations but also cultivate a deeper awareness of our interconnectedness with the natural world.

When I was young, I had a friend tell me she was going birding, and I thought, "Why? This seems like a gigantic waste of time. They have books with photos of all the birds. And the photos are better than anything we could take on our own. Plus there are no mosquito bites with the books. No Lyme Disease with the books. etc. etc."

Fast forward a few decades and birding is a source of meditation and happiness for me.

Honestly, this is one of the things I've actually enjoyed about maturing. Things that absolutely seemed like a total waste of time to my adolescent brain bring full enjoyment today. Same with food and drink.

I have feeders, fountain/bath, and lots of plants specifically planted to attract wildlife in my suburban plot. The other morning, I realized I had been standing at the window drinking tea for 15 minute watching the variety of birds, squirrels, and butterflies that all of this attracts. I realized at that point, I'm old.

Yes, learning to appreciate these 'little things in life' can be a definite positive about maturing. It's also beneficial as increasing age makes it harder to enjoy more dynamic experiences. I'm currently medically disqualified from driving, and will be for at least another year. This has substantially reduced my access to places and experiences I used to enjoy and which were a big part of my everyday life. I thank my lucky stars that I find peace and solace in my garden and with its wildlife.

> Honestly, this is one of the things I've actually enjoyed about maturing.

Agreed.

I also gave short shrift to the sounds that birds make. There is synergy between their appearance and the sounds they make.

I don't know where you live, but I am excited for the wood thrushes to return to my area. Their vocalizations are like flutes from another planet.

One of the biggest citizen science projects related to backyard birding is the UK RSPB's big garden bird watch [0]. This year 600,000 people participated, reporting almost 10,000,000 birds. I take part every year, but watch and enjoy my garden birds on a daily basis. In fact I spend more time watching them that I do TV. I've certainly learned loads of different species, and also recognise lots of different behaviours, e.g. how the different species interact with each other (or not), and how these behaviours change through the seasons. E.g. at the moment there is more inter-species aggression than usual because they are claiming territories and are feeding young. But in a few months time, as the food gets scarcer, we'll see larger multi-species flocks. It's lovely when one of the rarer or migratory species shows up, especially when they start to use the feeders regularly. I'm lucky enough to have a mature garden with multiple trees and micro-habitats, but in fact gardens are now a significant wildlife habitat in their own right.

I couldn't imagine not enjoying seeing so many birds.

[0] https://rspb.org.uk/whats-happening/big-garden-birdwatch?utm...

For my birthday this year I bought myself several bird feeders. When they all started arriving, my wife asked “how many bird feeders did you buy?”

“Enough for all the birds” was my only response. The rise in interest in birds as you hit middle age is definitely real.

If you're located well, now you can watch not just birds but also squirrels.

Squirrels! My main feeder is totally squirrel-proof. It's a tall pole and has a conical baffle (point up) about three feet above the ground. The squirrels cannot hold onto the pole and reach far enough out to get a grip on the upper side. Ha!

I spent some time when I first got it finding out just high the squirrels could jump and then positioned the baffle a couple of inches higher than that. Every so often one tries it and fails but they have learned not to bother now. I think that if two or more squirrels worked together they could manage to get round it but luckily they haven't figured this out yet.

> My main feeder is totally squirrel-proof.

I have yet to meet this unicorn. Every single "squirrel-proof" thing in my yard has been merely left by the squirrels until the other items are unavailable. Eventually, when they want the challenge, it is no longer squirrel-proof. I have one squirrel in particular that seems to be "that guy" in the group. The other squirrels are doing normal squirrel things, but this one guy is the daredevil shimmying down the rope to get to a feeder the others don't bother with.

Yes, I was sceptical but it does in fact work. Or at least it's higher than my resident squirrels can jump from a standing start. If a super-squirrel managed the jump I'd just raise the cone/baffle a bit higher. It helps that there are no overhanging branches for an airborne leap.

The other squirrel-proof feeder I had was one that stuck to a window-pane. It wasn't particularly attractive so I didn't keep it, but while I was using it, the squirrels never mastered spidey-grips to glass or the surrounding bricks.

I just attached a $3 slinky to the pole. The squirrels try to climb and the slinky drops them to the ground. Highly entertaining.

Careful, you may attract many unwanted animals as well that will damage your home or other items. Speaking from experience.

The problem is that different types of feeders attract different types of birds based on how they like to stand or grapple with their feet so you end up with multiple.

We are very casual birders but on our daily walk yesterday we watched a pileated woodpecker eat insects from a log for 5 minutes from about 25 feet away and it was wonderful :)

The size of Pileated makes it so special to see! We're fortunate to see one a few times a year - my wife saw one this week but I didn't make it upstairs in time to get a glimpse.

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