The Backyard Bird Chronicles

perch. I tell the little titmice a cautionary tale about a little bird that sat out in the open for twenty minutes wailing for its mama to come back, and only the hawk heard its cry. I tell them to not break my heart.

But some Fox Sparrows are slate brown. So I blend a deep brown and warm gray, or I start with a base of gray and add warm brown. I try many browns and grays. I know that feathers are never one color. They contain reflections of colors. I can never get the color to be as beautiful and as deeply saturated as the bird’s plumage truly is.

Just three weeks ago, I was taking much pride in my yard’s popularity. Over thirty species of birds had been spending at least part of the fall and winter in my yard. I kept track of their IDs. The birds sang their many versions of courtship songs. As I walked up the front steps, I was serenaded by the orchestra of life. But then the birds abandone

I still see in my mind’s eye the goldfinch with its swollen eyes. Did it fly off with the others? Is it sitting alone on the branch? I imagine it making futile forays to this now empty spot it knows by the habit ingrained by a precise number of wingbeats. I see it in my mind sitting on a nearby branch, wet, starved, weakening until it falls to the

But when I returned from a two-week trip, they were absent. I refilled the feeders and sang their song. A lone female came a few times, but later she left whenever she saw me. Their temporary disappearance is puzzling.

Like some people, the finches want whatever other birds have, as if what others have is better than what they have.

The Pine Siskins are very messy eaters. I find all the finches are slobs. For every seed they eat, they reject four and toss them on the ground. I don’t know the reason for this wasteful behavior, but their sloppy spillage makes the juncos very happy. Food conveniently delivered to the ground.