Dear Red-tailed Hawk

Dear Mr or Mrs Red-tailed Hawk,

I know you're tired and have just raised a couple of hungry chicks - that's a huge effort that I appreciate. I do however want to ask you what you fed them. They must have been driving you crazy at all hours of the day and part of the evening with hungry bellies that needed to be filled. I heard them screaming at you when I was outside playing with my dogs or filling the bird feeders. I would have expected you and your mate to become killing machines to ensure your brood had the best possible chance at life. 

In case you were a first time parent... Young hawks need meat. Lots of it. They need the calcium in the bones of that meat to help them grow big and strong. Without that they become floppy and useless as hawks. 

I am however sad to say that I think they are doomed. I think you fed them leaves and twigs which is why they stayed hungry and kept screaming at you. If you had considered their needs, you would have taken me up on my offering of fresh squirrels and chipmunks. All day long. Every day. Instead, you chose to ignore the offerings in my garden and for that your children will never live to see their real potential. I know we agreed that you wouldn't touch the cute little bunnies but for Pete's sake, could you not have made an effort to help rid my garden of this abundance of meat?!

I hear you outside now screaming and calling at the top of your lungs.  I think you're perched in one of the trees over my driveway.  You are sitting there calling and screaming and I don't even see any of the birds or meat offerings around my bird feeders, move. They don't show a high sense of "fight or flight" and are carrying on about their business as if nothing is threatening them. That's because nothing is threatening them thanks to you!

Do your job please and stop embarrassing your species (and your kids) before I have to call up the Cooper's Hawk to finish the job. Clear the backlog of offerings on my front lawn right away.  If you can take a Grackle or two with you, I'd really appreciate that as they too have multiplied in the past couple of weeks. Just remember to leave the Cottontails alone.

Sincerely

Occupier

Seeds or suet for dinner?

I was hardly in my new home when I logged into Amazon and looked for various kinds of feeders to adorn the garden with.  Birds needed to be enticed but not the squirrels. For those of you that follow me on Facebook, you will know the fun I have been having with my window bird feeder and a certain determined individual with a fluffy tail. I placed my bird feeders on my lovely expansive front lawn to give me the best view from the lounge (called a living room here by the way). I set up my scope and camera with a good view of the feeders and have really been entertained over the past few months with all their antics.  This blog entry is a little info about my feathered friends and what they get up to around the feeders.


One of the first birds that I observed feeding completely differently to birds I am used to was the White-breasted Nuthatch. They have long thin almost-upturned bills and looking at them I would imagine them being complete insectivores. When you watch them "working" the tree trunk, they start from the top and shuffle their way down so are always walking with their tails at the top and heads down while they probe under bark looking for insects hidden away. Quite comical as they also like to hang upside down like woodpeckers on branches and my suet feeder as it turns out, as they forage.
Much to my surprise, they were one of the first birds at the seed feeder. Seeds? After a couple of days the tree next to the window cleared of snow and a nuthatch perched there with something in his beak. He had taken a sunflower seed from the feeder, just one seed. He then flipped himself upside down and shoved the seed under a piece of bark. With his body still tail side up, he then started hammering against the shell to open it and eat the delicious morsel inside. Leaving the empty shell under the bark, he set off for another seed and repeated the process several times, each time under a different piece of bark. Not only did the seed eating surprise me, but the art of tucking it quickly under some bark to hold it still, was quite ingenious. In all this time, I have never seen him take anything other than sunflower seeds.
In similar behaviour ie. taking just one seed and flying off, the Tufted Titmouse likes to hold it between his toes and hammer away at the shell to get inside. I got rather a fright when in the kitchen one day, I heard this intense hammering against the window. I looked up and the titmouse was using the edge of the bird feeder to hammer out his breakfast.  All three of my woodpeckers take just one sunflower seed at a time and wedge it into a fork in the tree, rather than under the bark, also before they hammer it open and grab the bounty within. Watching a woodpecker that can't perch so folds himself double, getting seeds out of the feeder is quite comical but I'll save that for another day.

Apart from the hummingbirds, the catbirds and the orioles all other birds are pretty much after the seed offerings I put out. My seed mixture is made up of striped and black oil sunflower seeds, whole and shelled peanuts, whole and crushed corn, millet, flax, canary seed and safflower.  I have all of the seeds mixed up in these huge bins in the garage to make it easy for me but after observing the birds a bit more, I might be changing my feeding habits and putting certain seeds alone in feeders.

The Common Grackle are by far the messiest eaters especially when I put fresh seed out.  They are specifically interested in the shelled peanuts and will use their beaks to push everything out of the way until they get what they're after and briefly fly off.  This works out great for the doves who only stick to the ground and enjoy a shower of seeds at regular intervals but at the same time, they are making the squirrels and chipmunks fat. I have taken to sorting out and putting as few peanuts as possible into that feeder they
have easy access to. Due to the sheer number of grackles I have here (like pigeons back home), I have changed the weight setting on my squirrel-proof feeder. There's a perch/bar in front of the feeding holes that stays open or closes up, based on weight. With the grackles being the heaviest birds, I put it on the most sensitive setting and if they are lucky, the gap stays open just wide enough for them to get a few small seeds out at a time. It works best of course when more than one want to feeder together and their combined weight closes the gap completely.

Flapping wings to open gap

However, being the most incredible creatures ever, I watched a grackle regularly flapping his wings while at the feeder this morning. I eventually caught on that he had worked out that his weight was closing the gap to the seeds. He would flap his wings slightly to ease his weight off the bar and then launch himself forward to grab as many seeds as he could before the gap closed up again.

Grab as much as you can

He did this for about 15 minutes and was aggressive to any other bird that came near the bar, even the tiny sparrow. The other grackles waited their turns but none of them was as smart.  Sheer genius on his part and I gave him some silent applause. Hat off to him!

I have a pair of Northern Cardinals that are attached to each other. They spend most of the day flying around the garden, flashing their bright red feathers in the sun and then coming down to the feeder when it gets quiet. Funny thing though is that they never come down together. One of the pair will always stay in the tree or perch on a bush, while the other feeds. I have observed them for a few months now and the pattern doesn't change. When one of them is in possible danger or out in the open, the other stands guard. Not too long and they swap places to give the other a chance to feed. Initially I thought they may have been on a nest nearby but I'm thinking one plays a lookout role to keep each other safe.

Suet has become a daily necessity at the feeder, especially for those birds with chicks on a nest. The moms and dads are easy to spot as after a few greedy gulps of suet, they pick up as much as they can and fly off.  Here suet isn't just suet though. You buy suet with or without - grain, fruit, seeds and meal-worms.  The brand with the meal-worms has proven to be the most popular in my garden, especially the woodpeckers. Problem is that the woodpeckers don't get much of a chance to grab & go and putting out two suet cakes a day isn't economical for my pocket. I have ordered a new suet feeder that only has access from the bottom so the woodpeckers will have their own feeder.

Red-bellied Woodpecker

There seems to be a major requirement for almost all the birds in my garden for this protein-rich snack but I'm still learning about the right quantities of everything.  I think I need to get back to making my rice balls but turning them into rice cakes/slabs for the suet cages as putting them out in open feeders I brought from home, doesn't work. I tried large suet balls about the size of a tennis ball and couldn't understand why they kept disappearing after an hour or two. One afternoon I caught a crow flying off with this huge ball in his mouth. How he managed to pick it up was beyond me but he clearly had a need I couldn't understand.

The only bird I have never had near any of my feeders, is the American Robin. Being a thrush in disguise, he sticks to the shadows around the edge and every now and again, I hear him flipping over leaves looking for bugs to eat. I am lucky to have a large enough garden so have about 4 pairs of robins breeding around the house.  This morning I saw my first youngster - nicely speckled in front and a bit bolder than the parents as he came quite close to the feeder while I was filling it. He could fly very well and inspected the dove under the bird feeder before flying off. Their nests are usually well hidden and with the amount of greenery I have here, the nests could be anywhere.

Blue Jays have been another surprise for me at the seed feeder as I would have related them to shrikes based on look and aggression but they just love seeds, especially the corn (mealies). They are not loved by other birds (they just love munching nestlings!) and the dove will chase them away almost every time whereas the other birds will tolerate them. When the males were out courting a few weeks ago, they would land on the feeder pole and call out as loud as they could - they have a screeching kind of sound that wakes the neighbours.They must have babies now as they are flying off with mouthfuls of suet as soon as I can put it out.


I am up to 35 different species of birds that have come into or flown over my garden here in Armonk. I can only imagine how many others I have missed but remain optimistic that we shall remain friends. They have to be nice to the hand that feeds them after all.

Finding inner peace

Change is huge when you pack up your world and move it to another continent. You grasp at objects, thoughts and feelings that make you feel somewhat comfortable or at home but deep down you know you have to change everything to survive. It isn't as simple as learning to drive on the other side of the road or not being offended when the voice-activated GPS in your new car cannot understand a word you say so you still have to type in a detailed address every time you want to be directed somewhere. Planning a meal isn't as simple as it used to be as half the food you paired together, no longer exists. (Is now a good time to mention that I would give anything to taste a Woolies rotisserie chicken paired with a small wholewheat seeded roll?). Such is the same with birding...

I will always be insanely thankful to Jeanine for allowing us to stay in her home when we first arrived in New York. Somers is a delightful little town and it gave Jacques the opportunity to stay close to the office in a time when he needed the stability of not only changing his life, but tackling a tough new role at work.  I was able to spend a lot of my day looking into the line of trees close to the house, not only to admire the gorgeous snow scenes which appeared regularly, but also the incredible nature and wildlife on her doorstep. Within the first few days of arriving, I was drawn to the lounge (or living room as I now have to call it) windows to gaze out at the view. A few tiny footprints in the snow appeared when squirrels and chipmunks started to show themselves. Seeing wild deer walk through the back garden and hang around for hours under the trees on a particularly snowy day, gave me a sense of excitement. Then the first birds started hopping about in the snow and on bare branches outside the kitchen. That morning when I couldn't wait to pick up my camera and start snapping birds - something I have always felt should rather be left to the professionals - I found my mission. Get working on seeing as many new birds as possible.

From my first walk around the streets of Heritage Hills where I couldn't see through steamed up lenses or move the focus wheel on my binnies, I knew that birds would be my lifeline to adjusting. I didn't have a job to hang on to for some stability so the new birds and delights of nature I was experiencing, soon became my mini-obsession. For those of you that shared my initial journey and have been happy to wade through all my Facebook photos, you cannot understand how the interaction helped me to settle me in. You will be equally pleased to know that I will be starting my new role here at IBM on the 7th of June so my Facebook posts will very quickly disappear to just a normal trickle.

Back to birding... Before I left SA, I reached out to the Audubon Society here to ask about local clubs in the area. I am a great believer in birding with others - nothing is more disheartening when you see something spectacular and have no-one to share it with. There were a few clubs around me so I reached out once I was here and got some responses. It was with great enthusiasm that I dragged Jacques out of bed one icy cold Saturday morning and to a place called Croton Point where the local bird club was doing a count of species visiting a group of bird feeders. During part of the winter, this is how they count the different species and these particular guys did it from the warm confines of a building with large windows and not outside in the snow. We were immediately made to feel welcome and spent most of the hours chatting to the team there about birding back home and our move. In between we were admiring the birds at the feeders too. This initial interaction made such a great impression that I decided not to investigate other clubs and stick with this one (Saw Mill River Audubon).

I have had the pleasure of being able to attend most of the Monday and Thursday walks with the club during May so for once, have appreciated not having to get up for work every day. Most days I feel like an absolute beginner as the appearance and calls have me starting from scratch but every time I go out I start gaining more and more confidence. It does help that I have an incredible teacher, Anne, who is sharing her insane amount of knowledge with me (thanks Anne). It does also help that there are the most gorgeous locations in and around where I live, not excluding my garden of course, that makes wanting to be out there with my binoculars, a pleasure. I am enjoying getting to know fellow club members and having a shared passion helps make connections I didn't think were possible so quickly.

I never realized that this girl with blazing hot, African blood flowing through her veins would be able to use that same blood to find a link to her new world.  Changing your life is a journey and having inner peace to keep you sane while you travel that road with a GPS that doesn't understand your accent, is immeasurable.

Why America doesn't need Mariette

I have a great friend by the name of Mariette. She is a medical rep and takes her job very seriously. She visits doctors every day to talk to them about her company's products and how they work. She regularly writes exams and attends conferences to make sure she understands the studies, the impacts and the side effects. She knows and understands her products intimately. Her focus is on the doctors and pharmacists to keep her products top of their mind when prescribing or making recommendations. She doesn't deal with the direct public. Its a full-time job back in South Africa. I don't believe Mariette is needed in America.

America takes care of all of this with 90 second adverts on TV. Lots of them. Mostly for something to take care of bowel issues. Usually aimed at the older population as I have yet to see anyone in an advert, under the age of 50 unless they are posing as a grandchild. The advert starts with an actor performing some sort of activity or their inability to perform that activity. Either a very happy face or someone who is down in the dumps as they can't do something anymore (queue sad dog or pathetic grandchild). The background music is either something upbeat because Billy beat Diabetes or melancholy and slow because Mary can't poop.

So the advert has started and in the first 5 seconds you have an idea of the bodily function fixer-upper being advertised and then the unpronounceable product name appears in bold letters at the top of the screen. Sometimes in smaller letters, they will print the more commonly known name, just in case you are very familiar with it already. Just like a warm blankie on a cold night I suppose. For some of the more difficult names, they actually have a phonetic pronunciation under the name too! The music and video fade into the background and a shot of the product comes into the foreground...

A command-able voice starts talking about the product - if you're lucky its the voice of an old-and-out-of-work celebrity. The voice pronounces the name a few times in the next few sentences (just so it sinks in). They either get us to rejoice with Billy or sympatise with Mary. Details of how the medication works is explained in quite a bit of detail. Music and video come back to the foreground and happy faces talk to you about how great they feel or how this product has changed their lives.  Then comes the fun part and the music and video fade again.

I remember back at home when the tobacco companies and gambling houses first had to include the warning label in their advert clips. A quick flash on the screen and a number you could call to help you get over your addiction. It was like subliminal messaging - too quick to actually take it in. Then the National Credit Act came into being and all of a sudden you were read the small print on the radio for credit cards and vehicle financing. Usually every word articulated but at a speed that no rational ear could catch on. It remains small print after all.

NOT HERE IN AMERICA!  Here every single side effect of the drug is part of the voice-over. They are slowly articulated so that there's no confusion that something that appears to cure Frank's IBS can also allow him to die a slow and painful death (at least have suicidal thoughts or actions) and those handy-enough-to-carry-in-your-handbag wipes for Tammy's hemorrhoids could cause an allergic reaction to bees. As someone new to the genre, it is mind-blowing to hear the side effects of the drugs on the market. Mariette would shudder if she had to read them out to the general public every day like these guys are paid to do.  Everything from death to one's skin breaking out in awful sores are read out with perfect clarity.

The adverts here are not directed at the doctors or pharmacists - they punt their products direct to the general public. The public must ask their doctors to prescribe the products while the small print says you should speak to your doctor about whether the product would be suitable for you. You don't care about it being suitable, you want to stop your chronic diarrhea right now and any which way you can so that you can be as happy as Mike playing his guitar on a stage with hardly anyone in the audience. He looks so happy after all, that means the drug must surely work wonders.

I am sorry Mariette, but there is no place here for you. You aren't an old actor struggling to buy his next bottle of champers. You have pride. You have dignity. If you were here, you'd be without a job. You of course wouldn't have all the free samples that come with advertising the product but then I don't think you promote hemorrhoid wipes either.

Snow and South African dogs and Crocs don't mix

Having the babies adjust to the new weather conditions in Somers, NY has been a challenge. They arrived a few days ago from the heatwave that is current engulfing Gauteng, to a very cool 2 degrees half way around the Earth.  Without have a garden to roam freely in, we are back in the puppy training stage of going outside for regular walks on a lead where business can be taken care of.

I awoke on this second morning of the babies being here and put on my slippers (old red Crocs from Mr Price so not even the real thing) and a tracksuit to take them out.  I opened the curtains to the sight of beautiful snow falling - just like a Christmas card - but I wasn't to be put off.  Leads on and the sliding door to the deck was opened.  Not as cold as I thought it would be and the babies were rearing to go so we stepped out into a fairy tale.

For a full two seconds we all enjoyed the moment - snow falling and a perfectly white landscape.  First steps into the snow and it crunched pleasantly under foot.  Was about 15 cms deep and made a delightful crunching sound when we stepped onto it.

Trinity was first off the deck with her nose down and smelling the snow.  Neo was slightly tentative but joined her and they seemed to be enjoying themselves.  I'm still getting used to the leads that lets them have some freedom and soon enough they were at maximum and seemed to be enjoying themselves.  One of the leads got stuck to the edge of the deck and in the moment I managed to get it loose, the Hounds of Hades were released.

Both dogs surged forward with such power that both leads were pulled out of my hands and they were bounding off into the trees at full speed. I started after them and found that old crocs lack traction and when you're treading on unknown ground while shouting out their names, one's dignity is non-existent. While picking myself up in a panic, I looked up and saw what had caught their attention - a few deer were racing off into the white distance with two small dogs after them. I called my dogs again.I also know I was shouting "Liefie" at the top of my voice in between all of this. The hounds slowed down a bit. Thankfully the leads got a bit tangled in a bush.  As luck would have it, as I got near the stupid handles on the end of the leads, I slipped again and they managed to get themselves loose so were off again.

Lucky for me they slowed down enough for me to grasp both ends and we came to a halt.  They were rearing at the end of the leads to keep going but by then my "stern mother voice" had kicked in and they finally turned around and acknowledged me. Time to turn around and go back to the house but of course I had two dogs each on about 6 metres of lead, coming back at me in two different directions, each getting tangled in bushes and around trees.  By now Liefie had got out of bed and was enjoying the spectacle from the deck. I did slip and fall once more coming back to the house and it was a good one. Slippery rotting leaves hidden under the snow made for a great slip 'n slide.

Shaking it off, the babies were more than happy to greet their father while I arrived behind them with snow all over my bottom half. I was shaking in a different way.

My friend Sharon posted a picture on Facebook a while back describing the holes in Crocs - apparently that's where your dignity leaks out.  For once I have to agree with her. Several lessons were learnt this morning...
1) Crocs do not make suitable snow gear
2) Wear your Hunter Wellies out in the snow
3) Hold onto the dog's leads for "deer" life.