Interesting Magpie Behaviour

 Magpies

Since moving to our present property we've been neighbors with several generations of Magpies.  Each year a couple would successfully raise about 5 young ones.  As soon as they were old enough to fly they come to our yard where I keep running water and dry cat food to help them out.  Once they are old enough the whole family disappears for days only stopping by occasionally.

This photo is a young one and I'm not sure if it's guarding the food against others or catching the sun to dry off after playing in the sprinkler.  Interesting behavior I'd never seen before.

Magpies

 This family of Magpies has been coming to my house for about 3 years now.  They have a particular call for me on days when I've not put any food out yet.

There is a large bear population in this area making it a bad idea to have a compost bin with scraps of food in it so they recycle my left overs for me and in exchange provide some entertainment.

I've read that they prey on eggs and nestlings of smaller birds but my huge flock of sparrows and finches don't seem to mind them, even when nesting so perhaps it's the scarcity of food that makes they prey on smaller birds.

I have no idea why this fellow has a crest on his head.  I didn't see it when taking the photo and even enlarging it didn't reveal why.
He does have a beak full of stale muffin.

  The photos aren't great as magpies are hard to capture with a camera. They are very alert and intelligent so the slightest movement scares them away

Here are a few Magpie images by various artists for sale at Zazzle

Watercolor Magpie in Bird, Animal Collection by countrymousestudio
sell your art online with zazzle.

I love the pose of this Magpie on the Fence from aquartistic

A Magpie perched on a fence by aquartistic
View other Magpie Bags

The colors are beautiful on this one from  lemmingsolution

Yellow Billed Magpie by lemmingsolution
Browse Yellow billed magpie Posters

Great bird images for all species available from  birdorable

Cute Magpie by birdorable
Create a full color post card on Zazzle

Feeding the Birds

My husband and I agreed that it was time to stop feeding the birds.  I've seen numerous posts on the internet about the increasing cost of bird food. Without expensive seed like Niger, I was mostly feeding sparrows and chickadees, magpies and a few quail and in spring, a duck family.

So last spring, I decided to quit at a time when they could find their own but they never went away.  They sat out in the hedge calling and cheeping. What could I do? I had some cereal no one wanted to eat, one of those healthy ones that tastes like bird food.  They loved it.  Then I had some stale wholegrain bread and healthy muffins with peanut butter, a little bit of oatmeal, stale raisin bran, 9 grain cereal.  The magpies came by so I added fat scraps from the ham and leftovers.  Nothing like seeing a magpie try to balance on a line with half a muffin in his beak or a couple strings of spaghetti.

 

As cold weather arrived, I realized the birds weren't going anywhere so I went to the farm supply and asked what the cheapest edible food they had.  The cashier laughed and said chick scratch.  She said a lot of people feeding birds were switching since it was cheaper.  It's a mixture of chopped corn and wheat, half the price of sunflower seed and with absolutely no waste.

I've been feeding it for two months now and I think I have every sparrow in the neighborhood including a few song sparrows.  The flock of California quail has tripled and I don't think they'd leave the yard except for the neighborhood cat.  The magpie family is up to 8 or 9 now and they call if I forget to put it out or sleep in.

The good news is I've cut down my cost of feeding the birds to about half and am recycling leftovers too

Hungry Birds, Bad Photos & Frustration

Hungry Birds

We recently went through a cold, snowy spell where the birds were hungrier and more tolerant of my camera.  As I've mentioned before, I gave up using bird feeders, since the neighborhood cats were catching too many birds and instead I've been throwing the seed on the ground in a wide open area with no hiding spots.

 
This means I only get ground feeders and most of them are sparrows and brown, but that's okay, they're cheerful.  The other daily visitor is a family of Magpies.

bad photo of sparrows taken through frosty window.

 

I have watched this Magpie family over the last 3 years and noticed that most have remained in the area and still seem to spend time within their family.
They came down to feed in groups of three or less at one time, but there is 6 or 8 of them, in the family.
Each morning they stop by and if there is no food, they will sit on my roof and chatter.

Because it was so cold out I felt sorry for them and gave them dog food and a few pumpkin, sunflower and oatmeal muffins.

 

As you can see the photos are bad, first they were taken through a frosty window and second I could only get some of them to upload properly.

 I had to put them on Picasa Web Albums in order for blogger to take them, then they would only take two out of the whole album.

Has anyone else had problems uploading photos to blogger?

Magpie, Dated, Photo Ornament to Customize by countrymousestudio

Christmas Magpie Card to customize with your own greeting or name by countrymousestudio