More news

We saw a chipping sparrow in the yard for the first time in awhile. On the weekend we saw a cowbird in with a group of grackles etc, and this was the first cowbird we had seen in some time. On Saturday we had a large flock of the black birds in the forest area near the creek on our lot. We could hear them all rather than see them. I really love the collective noise they make- a tinkling that sounds a bit like wind chimes.
Other than that, it's still the down time between the summer and winter birds. There seems to be quite a few hairy and downy woodpeckers around. Sunday morning we saw three downys flying around the yard. The blue jays are still among our first visitors in the morning, waiting for the peanuts to go out. The house and gold finches have been busy at the niger seed feeders as well. The gold finches have lost their bright yellow colouring and are now their greenish/grey winter plummage.

Here's a link to another bird-related article in the star that I thought was interesting:
http://www.thestar.com/news/sciencetech/article/702408
"Scientists tout fossil as missing dino-bird link"
I love the picture that goes along with it.