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The morning flurry is a thing to behold. It seems like it begins around 5:30 am, then a lull, then about 8:30ish it starts up again. Times aren’t exact, of course, it happens whenever they want it to happen. Also, it doesn’t always happen in an exact sequence either but generally it starts slowly; A bird, maybe a chickadee or a house finch will start feeding on sunflowers. Then the goldfinches come and chase the house finches away. Then the tit-mice come and chase everyone away. Then the family of little finches (there about 4 of them) they come and chase everyone away. Birds can be such ruffians. 

0ver at the other feeders, I usually see the catbird starts the frenzy enjoying the grape jelly. Then the mama oriole flies to the jelly and the catbird leaves but comes back and she scoots away. She’s a shy one, that oriole. 

One of the woodpeckers (he is so funny, I’m not sure he is real bright either) starts pecking at the wooden bird feeder; he is a woodpecker, after all; while the other woodpeckers have figured out that that all they have to do is just eat the seeds in the feeders. Intelligences vary in every species, I guess. (no judgment here, just an observation). It has been observed that one of the woodpeckers shovels the seeds out of the feeders onto the ground until he finds the perfect seed. The squirrels do not complain about this at all.

At his point the gang of chickadees (The Sharks) and the gang of house finches (the Jets) duke it out, trying to intimidate each other to get the sunflowers. There are two sunflower feeders, you know. They just can’t seem to figure out that they would all be much happier if their just shared. They fly in and out and around. They glide to the woods in different directions and come back, bullying each other, back and forth, until everyone has eaten enough and can settle down for the hot part of the day. The goldfinches try to get a seed in edgewise and make kamikaze raids for sunflowers while the squirrels wait for the seeds to drop on the ground. 

This whole process lasts for, I don’t really know, maybe a couple of hours.  Birds require a lot of calories over the course of a day and they use up so much with all of this activity. Of course, it’s impossible to describe this eyeful of aerial mastery that actually goes on at various times through the day. Other times, its quitter allowing those who don’t want to deal with the gangs to come feed. There is always someone feeding at any given time, at the feeders in the yard. But, they are always looking around to insure their safety. Often one mate will stand guard while the other takes a turn feeding. I’m sure they aren’t “enjoying” this as much as I enjoy watching it. For them, of course, it’s a battle to survive. But, I will do my best to always have a supply of food for them. During this summer of covid, hurricanes, isolation, computer hacks, being homebound, canceled travel plans, not be able to hug my granddaughter, these little fliers are a huge source of joy and wonder. And I can’t imagine every tier of watching them.