I looked at the most recent picture and saw this, taken through a very pollen-covered sunroom window:
"OMG! OMG!" I yelled. Yes, yelled. "It's a rose-breasted grosbeak!"
You may think my excitement was a bit much, but we've had bird feeders in our backyard for more than 30 years, and we've never had a rose-breasted grosbeak before.
"Well, crap," I said. "I missed it." Always hopeful, I added, "Maybe it will come back."
This morning we were out back pulling weeds and messing around with the pond, and we finally sat down on the deck to rest. In my new glider chairs, for those of you that know. Luckily I had my pocket camera out there. I just happened to be turned toward the feeder and I saw...
He came to the tree and sat and watched the bird feeder. I kept snapping, but the sun came out, behind him of course, and I couldn't get a decent shot.
So I picked up a chair and quietly moved in a wide circle to get to the other side. I ended up sitting in the flower bed under the oak tree, getting those freaking oak blossoms in my hair. But it was totally worth it!
He sat and sat and sat, and FINALLY, after a good 15 or 20 minutes, he went down to the feeder.
I kept shooting and shooting and shooting. While I was taking 80 pictures, I was wondering why after all these years of bird watching, we finally got this wonderful backyard visitor.
The only thing I can think of is that we just started keeping our feeders up for the summer two or three years ago. So maybe that's why we have this beautiful visitor.
I just hope he's here for the summer and not just passing through. We'll be keeping our eyes open for his mate, as well.
Photos taken with my pocket camera, Canon PowerShot Elph 530HS, fully zoomed (12x optical). Cropped, but no other corrections except to the very first one.
