About once a year we have Cedar Waxwings arrive in our neighborhood, driven south by the cold fronts hitting up north.I suppose these particular birds flew out of Minnesota around the same time I did, but they didn't pay Continental Airlines to tote them down to Houston IAH like I did.
So it took them a few days longer to get here.
We are always thrilled to see them come.
They literally cover any bush that has berries, and strip the bush clean of berries in minutes.
They're really nervous birds, with a beautiful black mask, black beak, red tipped wings and yellow chest accents.
Their feathers look so sooth, almost like they were, well, waxed.
Their sound is pretty unique too. A high pitch jingle note, bzeee.
You might be able to play it on the link above. Multiply that sound by about 10, and you can get an idea of what our area sounded like.
Bernie was on a business conference call when the Cedar Waxwings arrived, and he said it was all he could do not to hang up on the call and run for his camera. As soon as he wrapped up the call he rushed to get me, and I ran outside (in my pink pajama's, :-0) in order to catch them having at our holly bush by the garage.
You can see one of the Waxwings in the lower right corner of the above picture with a berry in his beak.
They just gulp the berries down whole, and their digestive juices make short work of getting the fuel value out of the berry, and discarding the rest.
They usually show up with the Robin delegation. The robins are all over the place too, glaring at everyone as they run across lawns looking for worms. According to the link, these birds summer in Canada. Guess we should let Canada know their summer birds are down here now, and are doing fine.
"Hey Canada: Your Summer Birds arrived safely! They're doing fine! Send bird food!"
(There. Done and done. Got that little chore off my list...)
We're always glad to see our feathered friends from the North "snowbird" into our town.
They're going to be in for a thrill later today. Heavy storms are forecast, with large hail likely in the afternoon.
There's already been some lightening, and we're moving items into the garage that hail could damage. I love storms. High energy time for me, and that's sorely needed as we did pruning outside this weekend. The housework got behind.
Plus we went to see the movie "The Last Sin-eater." It is based on the book (same title), that we read a few years ago and absolutely loved. My mom had passed it along to us. Good movie, a Michael Landon Jr. production, and filmed in Utah, in areas near our son's house.
There were a grand total of six people in the whole theater. Seems like that is usually the case with good movies. If it comes to your area, drop everything and catch it. It will probably only be in theaters for a short time. Blink your eyes and you'll miss it.
Kind of like lightning flashes and Cedar Wax Wings.
If you want to see them, you've got to be quick.
1 comment:
There are few things as delightful on a Monday morning than your post subject dropping by and saying "here we are . . post us". Well, glad to see they finally arrived and doing so well for themselves. I laughed when I took a closer look at them and thought . .oh, is that what they're called. Trust you the research girl to have the name available. I think it is very sweet that Bernie would call you to come and see. It reminded me of how I ran out Saturday morning in my bright pink pajamas to try to capture the eagle in our tree.
I saw on the Today show this morning that Texas should expect big storms and so I put your home town into the weather network site to check to see how you were being pelted. I'm quite envious at this. I love storms and we rarely get a good thunderstorm.
The last sin eater. Is that the same one written by Francie Rivers? If it is, I have the book and it is very good. I really actually sobbed during parts of it.
Well, hunker down and enjoy your storm.
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