More feathered friends

We may be getting days and days of incessant rain, but spring iz sprung and the birds are busy in the garden!

I had to shoot this through glass, so it's a bit dark. Looks like this American Robin has food for the young-uns in his beak! My English mother used to bang on incessantly about how our robins were not REAL robins, like English Robins. Oh no, they were merely THRUSHES, not robins at all, blah blah blah. I guess that many moons ago, some homesick Brit got off the boat, saw one of these, and proclaimed it a ROBIN, feeling pangs of nostalgia for the cute little red-breasts across the pond. Decades later, or perhaps centuries, my mother was not amused. She seemed personally offended that someone had defiled her own vision of a robin by naming these thrushes after the sweet little birds of her youth.

Me, I love our robins. They are a sure sign that spring is on its way, and I love hearing their cheery song at dawn and dusk.

I also love the American Goldfinch:

Cracking open a sunflower seed!

I love these little guys! In winter, the boys turn from bright yellow to a dull olive-green shade. But now they are in their full, fancy breeding plumage.  They have a pretty song too.

Now if only it would stop raining, I'd be happy. It feels like it has been raining for weeks. Probably because it HAS been raining for weeks!