Ice Ice Baby! Waxwing! & New Pond Tick Today



Bohemian Waxwing at Sunset.
photo taken Jan.16th 2011
I couldn't lead out with the photo below... So I used a pretty one from last year I never published.



Waxwing Today? you can hardly tell from this photo... 
 I was pleasantly surprised when I saw this Waxwing in my garden briefly about 10am..
I took this record shot and then my camera's battery promptly died.
I put out apples but I never saw it return to eat them.
Still I'm very happy to see one and to add it to the Fair Isle year list of birds.

Note: Last Spring I wired red plastic beads to the branches I use to feed apples to the birds.
Idea being they would look like berries and attract birds to the apple.
Even though the Starlings & Blackbirds ate all the apple I put out 2 days ago,
the Waxwing paused long enough investigating the beads. Hey, I got to see the bird...
Proof that it works! not just another crazy idea of mine.

Ice Ice Baby!
We found another dead Iceland Gull...

Iceland Gulls - left: Adult (3 Winter?) - Right: 2nd Winter?
I did see 3 live Iceland gulls today driving Henry to school this morning.

Pond Tick!
My pond from my bedroom window with 2 visiting Greylags? that's a first!

One of the Greylag Geese - Doesn't look very healthy?
I put out some Chicken feed on the side of the pond but it would rather eat the plants around the edge of the pond. The other goose flies in an out every time I enter the garden while this one stays.

Auld Haa House gets Goosed!

My son had a mega sighting of his own today? photo by Henry