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Re: up close and personal with a red breasted nuthatch
- To: "Travis, Ginger" <Ginger@athena.dev.unc.edu>, <carolinabirds@duke.edu>
- Subject: Re: up close and personal with a red breasted nuthatch
- From: "Catherine Bezanson" <bezanson@ns.sympatico.ca>
- Date: Thu, 4 Nov 1999 21:39:45 -0400
- Sender: carolinabirds-owner@acpub.duke.edu
Ginger,
Up here in Nova Scotia, RB nuthatches are a common sight. I however have
had closer voluntary contact. these birds as you have seen, are quite tame,
given enough time and paitence they will come to a baited hand. I have had
one out of nowhere come and land on my hand. there is also a park in
Halifax where the Black-capped and Boreal Chickadees and white breasted
nuthatches will chase you down for food. it is quite an experience. I have
even touched a feeding pine siskin. that was cool.
bye for now
Tony Bezanson
Lake Echo, NS
bezanson@ns.sympatico.ca
-----Original Message-----
From: Travis, Ginger <Ginger@athena.dev.unc.edu>
To: 'carolinabirds@duke.edu' <carolinabirds@duke.edu>
Date: November 4, 1999 5:50 PM
Subject: up close and personal with a red breasted nuthatch
>Today at lunchtime I was standing on top of a stepladder trying to change
>the position of a suet feeder on a dead cedar in my yard. A bird flew to
the
>top of the cedar, 8 feet above my head, and I looked up and saw a red
>breasted nuthatch (one of a pair that seems to have settled in). I held
>still, grasping the cedar trunk with one hand, my other hand wrapped around
>the suet feeder. Suddenly the nuthatch flew down to the suet feeder, clung
>to the side of the basket opposite my hand, and began to dig away in the
>suet cake. (These little guys have fed voraciously on suet since they
>discovered it this week.) I could feel the pressure of the suet against my
>hand as the nuthatch whacked away at it. And the bird was so close to my
>face that I couldn't focus on it well -- I wished for my reading glasses!
>The nuthatch ate and I watched it for maybe 30 seconds before it flew, but
>it seemed like a really long time. Now that the experience is over it's
>kind of blur. Mostly what's left in my mind is, Wow!
>Ginger_Travis@unc.edu
>near Chapel Hill, N.C.
>