Good day in the front yard

(Click photo to enlarge)

This is my first attempt at blogging so bear with me. It was such a fantastic day for birding in my front yard. I live on Spirit Lake in Wisconsin so when you live on a lake your backyard is by the road and your front yard is by the lake. I have a deck facing the lake and have several feeders around it mainly filled with black oil sunflower seeds. I also have a small bowl filled with grape jelly for the Orioles. As I was walking by the sliding glass door going out to the deck I noticed a Scarlet Tanager in the yard. This is only the second time in all my years of living here that I have seen one. I frantically went for my camera that had no batteries or photo card in it as I had just returned from a trip and was recharging the batteries and the photo card was in my laptop. Quickly I loaded the newly charged batteries and photo card, put on my telephoto lens and was able to grab a few photos before it flew away not to be seen again for many years if the past is any indication.

In addition to the Scarlet Tanager, there were many other birds. 5 male Rose Breasted Grosbeaks and 3 females. Catbirds, Orioles, Pine Siskins, Grackles, Red-Winged Black Birds, Goldfinches, Purple Finches, Canada Geese, Red and White Breasted Nuthatches, Chickadees, Downy Woodpecker, Flicker, Wrens, Yellow Rumped Warblers, Yellow Warbler, White Throated Sparrows, Purple Martins, Tree Swallows, Tree Sparrows and a Bald Eagle. I'm sure I missed a few but this gives you an idea of what can be seen in a small area in a single day. Oh I forgot to mention the 2 Gray Squirrels and 2 Red Squirrels that I was trying to chase out of the feeders all day. I just saw my first chipmunk of the season too.