Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Brown Thrashers.

A few weeks ago, i noticed a peculiar bird hopping in and out of one of the bushes on our front hill. It was acting very secretive and it was difficult to get a good look at it. After looking through my bird book, i though that i had a Wood thrush. i peeked inside the bush and saw the beginnings of a nest. So we left it alone for a few days, but came back to check on it now and again.

We were pretty exited when we peeked in and saw a mama bird peeking back out at us. i immediately noticed the yellow eyes, and started thinking maybe this wasn't a Wood Thrush after all...but instead a Brown Thrasher. We've never seen these at our house/feeders so that was pretty exciting.


The nest is so far into the bush that i cannot see what is going on with the nest. i have to shove the camera in and snap a couple pictures. Then take the camera out and see what is going on in there. One morning when i noticed that both mama and papa bird were hanging out in my peach tree, i tip toed over to the nest and snapped this picture. The eggs are speckled with red/brown. This confirms that indeed have a nest of Brown thrashers, and not Wood thrush who have blue eggs.

While mama bird sits on her nest, this papa bird is always standing guard. He never strays too far from the nest. He sounds a warning if we get too close, and in the evening he serenades us with his beautiful song. Brown thrashers mimic other birds, similar to a mocking bird. Their song is distinguishable because they repeat each note 2 times.


Recently i noticed both mama and papa have been out more, so i shoved my camera into the bush to see what was happening with the nest. i was super happy to see these 4 baby birds with mouths open waiting for a their meal. i think when i moved the branches aside they thought i was mama coming in with a worm.

My kids have been super excited to see the baby birds, and are getting quite good at recognizing some of the birds that frequent our feeders.

While looking up a bit of info on the Brown Thrashers we learned that it is the Georgia State bird!! Just for fun we found some Brown Thrasher Printable Coloring pages here and here. We also found an interactive Brown Thrasher coloring page here.

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