For the Birds

By spring you’ll see American robins on every lawn, but the common local bird really caught my attention on Monday morning. There were dozens of them picking at the tiny, shrivelled crabapples on a tree in front of my house.

Seriously, I’ve never seen so many robins in one place — and they were having a hell of a time out there, flitting around, tugging fruit off the tree, relaxing on the branches. It was quite a show for my cats as well; to them, watching birds is like a Netflix binge.

My wife said there were a bunch of waxwings hitting the tree also. I wouldn’t know a waxwing if it were pecking my eyes out, so I’ll have to take her word on that.

I don’t know if this influx of robins means anything. We can be hopeful and see it as a sign of spring, but I’m mostly hopeful that they have enough to eat until the snow finally melts.

7 thoughts on “For the Birds

  1. Send them over here. We put out two feeders and have had maybe one or two visitors per day. Or maybe sunflower seeds just aren’t as appealing as crab apples.

  2. Cedar Waxwings prefer berries, crabapples, fruit. Ours in North Bethlehem eat blueberries from your hand by the end of the summer. They’ll only peck your eyes out if you have Bob Costas Devil-Eyes.

  3. From what I hear robins do not migrate. They are here all winter long. They just keep a low profile during the winter months and you don’t notice them.

  4. I noticed a lot of robins last week in downtown Troy on the Russell Sage campus- singing so loudly and eating the leftover berries on the trees. Sounded like Spring but was terribly cold!

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