Creating A Bird Sanctuary In Your Yard

March 5, 2005 | sweetliberty

[sweetliberty]

Between this thread and the previous one, there has been a lot posted on the topic. I have the squirrels from hell, and I have gotten am getting a handle on it..

[Dysart]

I sounded like Debbie-downer there :) LOL

[Dysart]

I live in a rural area of Joisey (yes-they exist) Niced sized yard with a ton of trees that backs up to miles of protected land. I love Cardinals but can't seem to keep the squirrels (whom I like too) to stop eating their food.

Have you incorporated a baffle device between the feeder and the ground or the tree? This works for me. The squirrels now feed on the seed and nuts that always find the ground. They do just fine with that and watching them attempt to circumvent the baffle is great fun.

[GodBlessUSA]

Hey Debbie Downer. LOL! You didn't sound like a downer :) There are so many trouble maker out there. I would be so crushed if Chickadees or any bird ever had trouble like that.

I have one house on a pole. The others I have on trees. I put a hole guard on for only Chickadees and Titmice but House wren can fit. I haven't had many interested takers. They like to be in a covering so yours sounds good. I haven't been lucky so I don't know if it's my placement of the houses.

I really put them up because I was hoping for Chickadees to stay. Although, my yard is so busy with birds I don't know if they even would.

[MamaTexan]

You have Cardinal babies already?

Oh yes! Mama Cardinal has 2 or 3 male fledglings, and at least 1 female. (They kind of hang out together)

One of the males only has a couple of crest feathers....he looks like the birdy version of a *punk rocker*, LOL!

RE the woodpecker: I can't remember where I read it, but supposedly woodpeckers will screech by an insect to 'stun' it - maybe your woodpecker's breakfast was trying too hard to get away! :)

[sweetliberty]

I am just sick about one of my Goldfinches and I can't imagine what happened to it, or what is wrong with him. He has a huge growth on the side of his neck. It is bigger than his head and neck. The only thing I can think of would be the bite of some awful spider or insect. Are birds plagued by such things. I know they can get bitten, just not sure how much of a problem it is. I doubt he will survive. I hope it isn't anything contagious.

[MamaTexan]

Oh my!

Lets see, a knot on the side of a birds neck could be explained by an insect bite, but I couldn't imagine what insect would crawl under a birds feathers or be able to bite through them, either.

Do birds have glands in their necks like people?

It could possibly be an abscess from a puncture wound (a beak during a mating squabble?) (an injury from a branch during a bad landing?). Abscesses are gross, but if it drains, he should be okay

Is he feeding/drinking normally, or is he in distress?

I'm just tossing around ideas.....I'll look and see if growths are common. If I find anything, I'll let you know!

[sweetliberty]

Yes, he was eating normally, but he obviously doesn't have full range of motion in his neck.

[MamaTexan]

It's very good that he's eating. Another though occurred to me.

The feather shaft comes up through the skin on a bird. An ingrown feather shaft could conceivably cause a lump...like the same ones people get from ingrown hairs.

I haven't found anything yet except a couple of extremely scientific papers on 'Lymphoproliferative disease', which would have to be a glandular disorder, but now I'm trying to track down a description of it NOT written in *biobabble* .

[sweetliberty]

Thanks. I've never run across anything about such things in the reading I've done, but birds do get infrected with things such as West Nile, from mosquito bites, so it makes sense that they might also be vulnerable to other small pests that can do big damage....mites, bees, fleas, ticks. But some of your other ideas make sense too. Maybe these things happen more frequently than we realize and we just notice them because we're watching the birds more closely.

[MamaTexan]

Maybe these things happen more frequently than we realize and we just notice them because we're watching the birds more closely.

Very good point.

Like I said, the fact he's eating is good. It means whatever the problem is, it's outside his digestive tract, not inside it.

I'm not up to date with West Nile in birds, but if memory serves, it manifests itself more as a general, over all sickness than a visible symptom like swelling.

You can rule out a glandular disease, too. Apparently, Goldfinches have what's called a 'glandular stomach', not glands in their necks like humans. :)

[sweetliberty]

I wasn't suggesting it was West Nile, just using that as an example of things birds can get from insects.

[MamaTexan]

Oh, no. I didn't mean you were! :)

Birds can catch all kinds of things from bug bites, that's true....I was just brainstorming the differences between what you had said about you Goldfinch and what the symptoms are for West Nile.

[bannie]

Someone transported some of your red squirrels to Bakersfield, CA. They live on a golf course; and PG&E personnel hate them because they use the wires as their own EL.

[bannie]

I enjoyed your thread. Beautiful pictures of beautiful birds! Thank you.

[MamaTexan]

We do have some amazing pictures here, don't we?

Sweetliberty is actually the originator of this thread, as well as the one before it.

This one has already gotten almost a thousand replies. WOW!

We sure are a chatty bunch!

LOL!

[bannie]

:*)

[fnord]

put me on your bird ping list please :-)

[sweetliberty]

Will do.

[rustbucket]

Green Jay