Saturday, April 22, 2017

Ruffled feathers. . . . . . . . . .


Spring brings the robins and from what I see in my garden, robins love water.
Bathing in it even more than drinking it perhaps.

The American robin is quite a large songbird of the thrush family, non-migratory 
here in North Carolina. It is usually the first bird to sing at dawn - I'm hearing it
 loud and clear these mornings. . . . . . . .and it often sings all night in spring!
Named after the European robin, that cute chubby little bird known as 'robin redbreast'
 in the British Isles because of its reddish-orange breast, the two species are not
 closely related. The European robin belongs to the flycatcher family and is much smaller.


Our larger - 9-11" - American robins love visiting the bird baths.
Usually easy to tell the difference, the male has an almost black head and brick-red
 chest, compared to the female's gray head and dull red chest. When wet like this
 visitor, it's harder to really tell!



Dipping a claw to test the temperature?


Not bad for a splash about in the Spring sunshine this week.


Drying off doesn't take long on a warm day.


Need to get to that itchy bit under the bill.


The American robin, a very territorial bird, is most active during the day and assembles
 in large flocks at night. It's one of the earliest birds to lay eggs, those pretty
'robin's egg blue' ones, in a nest of coarse grass, twigs, paper and feathers,
 smeared with mud, and often cushioned with soft materials. I haven't found a
 nest yet this season, but I have a feeling there's at least one in the back garden!

All photos taken on a hot April afternoon this week.


14 comments:

  1. Love the robins. They really have a pretty song. That bathing robin looks like it was here yesterday. Five inches of rain. Terrible for so much. For some reason, I find robin eggs laying around the yard and garden and wonder if they just lose them in flight or what.

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  2. Dear Mary, You took some very fine pictures. Your robins look so silly all wet and ruffled. Watching them must be a lot of fun.
    They disappear during the winter months in this climate. They have come back along with many other birds. All of them competing to tell us who has the best song. Isn't spring wonderful.

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  3. I have been watching the robins outside my "office" window - really it is the eat in part of the kitchen I am using for an office. We also have a cardinal couple making a nest nearby. Your photos are great!

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  4. Such cute pictures of the robin, Mary. He sure is one clean bird now.

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  5. Flocks of robins came to our garden earlier in the year - I think they were migratory. They stripped the cotoneaster bush of its berries in no time. Now we see robins here and there, but not in large numbers as before. Your ruffled robin looks like he needs a good toweling off! Great photos.

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  6. I thoroughly enjoyed the pictures of your robin. I watched one this morning in the grass beneath our apple tree (in full blossom). Always a cheering sight.

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  7. What a cutie, and you have some amazingly beautiful shots, Mary. Robins are one of the first birds we see here in the spring as well. Ours are big plumper and look a bit like pigeons!

    You've reminded me to keep those bird baths filled!

    Love to you,

    Jane x

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  8. That was fun to see. I have not seen robins in such private moments in the bath. Ha! In fact, I have not seen a robin this year at all.

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  9. Wow they are different to our English Robins. They look like a cross between a Blackbird & an Robin.

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  10. Beautiful shots of your bathing robin. Have a good day!

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  11. Beautiful photos of the robin having a bath. It looks so sunny, warm and green there as we still deal with cold and snow. xx Pam

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  12. Mary, as always your photos are beautiful!!

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  13. Well, now I know the reason for the size difference between the two Robins. How confusing to give it the same name if not related! Haha, and there I was thinking it was somehow some throw back to war rations or something....although of course that makes no sense for birds! :) Your photos here are truly incredible. Love how he's enjoying that cooling soak.

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