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Eastern Redcedars are great for birds
Yesterday the Eastern Redcedars, Juniperus virginiana, around the Nature Center were full of birds eating their round cones now ripe and covered with a beautiful blue waxy substance. Byron “Skip” Layman called me out of the office and we marveled at some of these beautiful birds. We noted a pair of Pileated Woodpeckers which have also carved some nice rectangular holes in the nearby trees. I had fun recounting a story from last fall when a Pileated was very brazen about eating these cone “berries” a few feet away from our front door. He hung on dearly to the weak branches and bounced up and down, sideways, upside down eating his fill. Other birds attracted to this native tree included Yellow-Rumped Warbler, Golden-Crowned Kinglet, Fox Sparrow and Purple Finch. The Purple Finch female has some wonderful steaks on her face making identification easy when compared to the more common female House Finch. Many of these birds also visit our water feature in front of the Window on Wildlife and Skip was able to get some excellent photos of them, some posted here: male Purple Finch, Eastern Redcedar “berries”. If you’d like to learn more about our winter birds, we invite you to participate in our Project Feeder Watch Programs starting on Friday, December 5 from 12:30 to 2:30 and Saturday, December 6 10:30 to 12:30 and every other Friday and Saturday thereafter through the winter. We sit at the Window on Wildlife and count the high number of each bird species seen during the count period. This is a citizen science project coordinated with Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology. Bird Watchers of all levels are invited to participate for the whole counting periods or just for a few minutes during your nature center visits. For more information call us at (937) 855-7717.
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