Winging it

Yards and woodlands were all atwitter over the past few days. It would appear that the spring bird migration was definitely getting warmed up despite some dips in the temperature. Canada geese settled at the neighbor's pond, but they weren't the only birds making an appearance.

This past Sunday's warm weather brought the first hummingbird of the season to the yard. It visited the feeder very sporadically and I was able to snap a couple of photos on Monday. I don't believe that the hummer was one of the regulars we feed during the summer. When Wednesday rolled around, there was no hummingbirds in sight.

Nonetheless, my aunt, who lives in Warren, Pa., posted on Facebook that she had an oriole visit on Wednesday.

Despite having feeders out for a few days, I have yet to see one.

​I have spotted some catbirds and rose-breasted grosbeaks over the few days. However, their visits were so fleeting that I did not get photos.

I was able to finally capture a photo of an eastern phoebe, despite the fact they have been back for at least a couple of weeks.

Last Saturday, I had some unusual visitors to the bird feeders. They were myrtle or yellow-rumped warblers While they are common visitors to the area, I had never seen them at my feeders.

The Cornell Lab's allaboutbirds.org stated, "Yellow-rumped Warblers winter across much of central and southeastern U.S., and they sometimes come to backyards if food is offered.

To attract them, try putting out sunflower seed, raisins, suet, and peanut butter."

​After reading that post, I surmised it wasn't that rare of an occurrence after all. A few days later the warblers appeared at their usual summer haunts near the neighbor's pond.

The spring snowstorm on April 18 brought some chipping sparrows to the feeders. They appeared less than thrilled about the cold weather.

Over the next few days a couple of pairs of purple finches showed up a the feeders. While my sightings were  considered normal, an April 10 post on the Seneca Rocks Audubon  Society's Facebook page touted a rare visitor.
"A yellow-headed blackbird is currently being seen coming to the feeders of a residence near Knox. This is a rare visitor to Pennsylvania and Clarion County. This birds normal range is the mid-western plains of the US and Canada," the post said.

However the bird sighting that I was atwitter about was a barred owl that I first photographed in mid-April. I had heard owls calling over the past years, but wasn't able to capture any photos.

I absolutely loved this owl. It was so very cooperative in terms of pictures.

In fact, I spoke to it and told it that I had some red squirrels and chipmunks that needed "taken care of" in the yard.

Low and behold, my husband said that he had spotted the owl in the yard the next day.

​I have also continued to see the owl and hoped that it would stay in the area.

"The Barred Owl’s hooting call, 'Who cooks for you? Who cooks for you-all?' is a classic sound of old forests and treed swamps. But this attractive owl, with soulful brown eyes and brown-and-white-striped plumage, can also pass completely unnoticed as it flies noiselessly through the dense canopy or snoozes on a tree limb," stated a post on allaboutbirds.org.

The post went on to say that "the great horned owl is the most serious predatory threat to the barred owl. Although the two species often live in the same areas, a barred owl will move to another part of its territory when a great horned owl is nearby."

However the post on allaboutbirds.org raised the possibility that the owl I photographed might just stick around.
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"Barred owls don’t migrate, and they don’t even move around very much. Of 158 birds that were banded and then found later, none had moved farther than 6 miles away," the post stated.

Birds were not the only ones fitting around. I saw several mourning cloak butterflies on past sunny warm days.

​I spotted as many as six in one area at a time.

There were skirmishes among the butterflies. They fluttered so hard that I could actually hear their wings.

A post on insectic.com said, "The male mourning cloak is territorial and will patrol the same area to increase its chances of mating and get fast access to the best resources."

"The mourning cloak butterfly male is known to display lekking behavior. ... The males gather in one area and compete against each other to impress the females, which will typically settle for the winner," the post continued.

It also said that "the butterflies don’t usually fight among each other.

Their lekking behavior refers to them establishing given territories and defending them against competitors and intruders."
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The whole show was very interesting to watch.

I was also to get a shot of what I believed to be a gray comma.
​I had seen some flitting around, but wasn't able to get a good photo.

The bumblebees were also out and about feeding on some trailing arbutus.

More and more spring flowers were encouraged by the warm weather this past weekend.

Sherman decided to help the flowers out by watering them.

Clem then felt compelled to follow suit. That's just the nature of things 'round here.