Throughout most of the year, I have a good variety of birds passing through my yard, including the occasional rarity like a boreal owl or pileated woodpecker.
During most of August however, I’m generally stuck with the good old house sparrow. Many, many house sparrows as the young of the hatch year are now flying with the adults. Birders’ opinions on these birds differ widely, but at least they give me something to look at in the slow months.
One thing that I’ve always enjoyed watching is their ‘exploding flock’ behaviour, and they never fail to disappoint. I have no idea why they suddenly lift off as one entity, but it’s a common behaviour.
You might wonder why I find this so enjoyable, and there are two reasons.
There are usually a few house finches or mourning doves feeding on the edge of the flock. When the house sparrows explode these birds remain where they were, and you can just tell by the way they swivel their heads around that they’re thinking wha?? What happened? What was that? I especially enjoy the mourning doves – by the time they’ve figured out what just happened the sparrows are back on the ground.
The second, and most important reason, is that they scare the crap out of the ever-present squirrels.
🙂