Odd Birds

This year two unusual house sparrows have been visiting my backyard, the darker bird with white wing feathers forming a "v" or heart shape on his back and a lighter sparrow sporting larger white wing patches.

I call them Mr. V and Angel.

I first noticed little Angel while watching quail in late May.

typical house sparrow (left), "Angel" (right)

taking a dust bath

My last sightings of Angel were in July:

Mr. V has been a regular backyard visitor since June.

And he's still here today:

I also observed a strange looking phainopepla one day in October.

For comparison, the picture on the left is of a normal colored male phainopepla with all black head feathers.

Notice the white head feathers on this fellow:

Have a good day!

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June Birds

Greetings!  Here are some more birds on saguaros from June:

curve-billed thrasher

Gila woodpecker

brown-crested flycatcher

house finches

verdin

white-winged doves

pyrrhuloxia

Hasta la vista...

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White-winged Dove

up on a saguaro cactus:

In the last picture, the dove is not alone:

Click the picture to enlarge and find another bird who loves saguaro fruit. :)

I hope your day is sweet and easy!

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Agave in the Sky

Linking to Skywatch Friday

Have a great weekend!

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This 'n that

Around the home and garden...

This year we're growing herbs in containers on the patio

sweet basil

and we fenced in the tomatoes and covered them with shade cloth

so far, so good!

The pomegranate and citrus trees are setting fruit for the first time since the big freeze of February 2011.

Hummingbirds share their nectar feeders with verdins and woodpeckers.

The kingsnake made a brief appearance before retiring to its home in the wall.

Plumbago

After a year and a half, I finally finished another patchwork quilt:

Vitex tree

oatmeal cookies

Have a great day!

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Spring Birds

Hello! While looking through my photos, I found these bird pics that hadn't made it into blog posts yet, probably because a few of them are blurry, but the encounters were sweet and I wanted to share them anyway.  From the last week of March and first week of April:

white-crowned sparrow

 

black-chinned hummingbird

brown-crested flycatcher

Gambel's quail

verdin

cactus wren

northern cardinal

ladder-backed woodpecker

northern mockingbird

vermilion flycatcher

Enjoy your day!

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