Greensboro Birds

Needing to escape some loud maintenance being done on our building this morning (the young Happy, you might recall, is terrified of loud things), Happy and I spent a couple early-for-us hours walking the Lake Brandt shoreline at Bur-Mil Park.

A male Eastern Bluebird guarded this nestbox by the fishing pond. And worked on being adorable.

This male Eastern Towhee was, to quote verbatim what I said to Happy, singing his balls off. I later amended that to “singing his brain out,” but you’re old enough to hear the unexpurgated version.

Here’s a new bird for Greensboro Birds: It’s a Pied-billed Grebe. They’re rarely seen flying, preferring to dive underwater when spooked, and they migrate at night. Grebes also have weird flat toes instead of webbed feet.

The Carolina Chickadees are happy about the blossoming trees. This one, along with about a dozen others, was intently feeding at the blooms.

Canada Geese were absent from the fishing pond when we arrived. Over the next couple hours, however, small groups of geese flew low overhead and convened there. By the time we left the park, the pond hosted a few dozen honking birds.

Near the noisy Towhee was this Downy Woodpecker. He was flying acrobatically from pod to pod, digging out leftover seeds from winter.

On arriving home, we discovered the noise was still going, so Happy and I took off for our usual haunt across the street. Look for that report tomorrow!