As much as we love birds, wildlife reserves, and visiting nature centers, we thought it was fitting the other day when migrating birds decided to descend on our home. I guess they got the word out that we are a good stop on their way south! Common Grackles can be found year round in Missouri, but this group was definitely going somewhere warmer for the winter! Perhaps they know something we don't? The pictures really don't show the enormity of what we saw, but it will give you an idea. Here you can see the birds peppering our back neighbor's lawn. Eventually they were in all the surrounding yards as well as the trees.
Pete thought it looked like something out of the movies as hundreds, possibly thousands of birds came flying through the yard! The noise was unreal. It was surreal when they were scared and all took flight. They would return after a few minutes. I went out and put some feed at the feeder and some water in the bird bath. Zeke and I tore up half of a loaf of bread for them and we put out some fresh pumpkin and seeds for them to eat. The birds fought madly over the water and food.
After a brief rest of about 15 minutes, they were off again. Bye-bye birdies!
