The white-crowned sparrows (Zonotrichia leucophrys) seem to arrive as a flock, swamping my feeders and emptying them in record time (with some help from the finches). As I looked out my home office window Monday afternoon, I noted that the three feeders I can see were once again empty, or at least nearly so.
But the sparrows didn't take off. Some hopped about cleaning up seed on the ground but others went after my succulents, specifically the Aeonium arboreum currently in flower.
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| This particular sparrow, perched atop an asparagus fern, was well-behaved |
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| However, this was one of several that focused on my Aeoniums |
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| Nothing in The Cornell Lab's summary of this bird's behavior mentions an appetite for succulents |
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| but I've seen these same birds go after these succulents in previous years |
They even fought over Aeonium flowers.
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| This was a temporary detente. One bird always chased the others away before nipping away the the flowers. |
I got around to refilling the feeders yesterday afternoon.
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| This isn't a great photo but I noticed a single bird calmly sitting on the refilled feeder, as if wondering where all his cohorts were |
Hopefully, the full feeders will distract them from the succulents, at least for a time.
In other unusual bird news, while taking photos in my front garden, I thought I saw a crane standing on the flat roof of a neighbor's house several doors down the street. After convincing myself that I might have seen the bird move his head, I ran and got my telephoto camera lens as cranes certainly aren't a common sight here.
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| It's definitely not a real bird. It didn't move or turn its head. It's not clear why it was put there, just beyond what appear to be solar panels. Perhaps, like the plastic owls I often seen mounted on roofs, its purpose was to scare away other birds. |
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