"Fall Fun"

Fall has the capacity to make me sad because I hate to see the birds fly away south.  But, it does become Fall Fun when I get some unusual visitors in my yard.  If you look very carefully at the photo below, taken through the front door, you will see a MacGillivray's Warbler.    What a lucky moment that I spotted it from my kitchen window on an early day in September.  I also saw an Orange-crowned Warbler but didn't score a picture.  They flit around so quickly!

Same rock around the same time, digitally zoomed in is below. On the left is a very common  House Sparrow having a swig.  The one  in the foreground acting like she is peaking back at the sparrow, is a House Finch.  To her right towards the back is a Pine Siskin.  I see these birds year round at my feeders. Well, the Pine Siskins do leave in the heat of the summer and I think they head up into the Blue Mountains that frame our valley.

The yellow bird center below left is a female Western Tanager, another voyager. She was headed south and she stuck around a few days.  I saw her several times.  Behind her in a sort of blur is another House Sparrow, and a very blurry American Goldfinch.  Many people here don't realize that the Goldfinch also sticks around.  They just lose that bright color and become sort of drab.  I'm sure that has to be some natural defense so they aren't quite so easy for the hungry hawks to see. 

The Canadian Geese have been flying over and calling me to run outside and scan the sky.  Many of them winter here in the valley after spending the summer somewhere up in Alaska and Canada.

So, on this Day 8, "Fall Fun" of Two Weeks in Autumn Photo Challenge, you see how easily entertained I can be.  A real "CHEEP" date.

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