A Tree Full of Birds

This morning it was 12 degrees when I woke up with a windchill around 0! The sun was brilliant but just wasn't strong enough to penetrate those winds from the north! First things were first and I pulled on my Uggs, my wool coat, and half gloves and braved the morning cold to fill up the deck platform feeders with millet. Yesterday's leftover were frozen into a sheet of ice and millet that looks curiously like millet brittle. Although, the squirrels like to pick up a chunk and chew on it, the little birds: juncos, sparrows, and wrens... are not that thrilled with it. So fresh millet for everyone!

Then an hour or so later I was upstairs and looked outside into our big backyard walnut tree. There must have been at least 30 red-winged blackbirds decorating the treed like christmas ornaments. They were basically waiting their turns at the feeders. Poor guys...their wetland home a couple of blocks over is all frozen! I had seen a small flock last week mixed with the robins and starlings that were devouring the berries off the hawthorn trees...but this was QUITE a gang!

I'll miss these little winter visitors when I move to Florida. However, I won't have to worry about pulling on my uggs to go out and feed the birds in December!