In the shade of newly-leafed trees

House finch on fence post at Cougar Creek park.

It looks like this is a favourite perch.

All around us in the trees, his companions were singing, every one of them invisible among the leaves.

Desktop bird watching

The winter birds are back. This afternoon, my feeders served juncos and towhees, (on the ground), bushtits at the suet in the maple, and chickadees, a white-crowned sparrow, a pair of finches, nuthatches, a tiny wren (who looked at the seed, decided it was too big, and flew away) and an unexpected newcomer, all at the table close to my window.

Black-capped chickadee. An old-timer.

Chickadee and my little stone angel.

Chestnut-backed chickadee! I haven't seen one for years.

Black-capped on left, blurry chestnut-backed on right. These are fast little birds, even compared to the larger black-capped chickadee.

The one in back is another black-capped. The bellies are often buffy, but I think this one also has reflected orange light from the birdbath.

House finch

Squirrel cleaning up the leftovers.

The nuthatches are too quick for me; they zip in, snatch a seed, zip away while my already-focused camera thinks about taking a photo. And the juncos -- ah, the juncos! Bounce, bounce, bounce, hoppity-hop; always in motion, always at a distance. They don't like the table with a camera pointing at them over the computer screen. I think I need some camouflage; a bird blind on my desk.

House finch disease?

This is worrisome: a pair of house finches has been visiting my sunflower seed tray. This afternoon, I took some photos and discovered signs of house finch disease.

The male, in bright red, seems to have discharge from his eye.

Three years ago, I had one with a severe case. As far as I know, he died of it.

This is a common respiratory disease of finches, as well as many others, from chickens to pigeons, even to hawks. It is caused by the bacterium Mycoplasma gallisepticum. In the wild, it mostly affects members of the finch family. Chickadees often carry antibodies without showing any symptoms of having had the disease.

The symptoms are:

... red, swollen, runny, or crusty eyes; in extreme cases the eyes become swollen shut or crusted over, and the birds become essentially blind. Birds in this condition obviously have trouble feeding. You might see them staying on the ground, under the feeder, trying to find seeds. If the infected bird dies, it is usually not from the conjunctivitis itself, but rather from starvation, exposure, or predation as a result of not being able to see. (Cornell)

This one seems alert and able to navigate still. He may recover, I hope.

Alternatively, he could have salmonellosis, or some other condition. Last time, in the end stages, the bird's feet were badly swollen, as well, a symptom I don't find in the description of either house finch disease or salmonellosis. This guy's feet look ok, so far, but his mate's feet don't look right.

She doesn't hold the perch normally. Otherwise, she looks fine.

More info from Cornell:

Although infected birds have swollen eyes, the disease is primarily a respiratory infection. It is caused by a unique strain of the bacterium Mycoplasma gallisepticum, which is a common pathogen in domestic turkeys and chickens. The infection poses no known health threat to humans...

I took action immediately; removed the feeder tray, and bleached it thoroughly to kill any germs. I won't use it again; it's got too many cracks where gunk can collect.

Cornell recommends also raking up dropped seed; I do this at least every second day, partly for neatness sake, partly because the sunflower shells attract slugs. I keep the bird bath scrubbed out, but usually don't use bleach, trusting to clean water and a good brush to prevent contamination. I'll be using bleach now, until I see no signs of disease.

A white-crowned sparrow at the same feeder shows no sign of illness.

More info:

• Index page for Cornell's discussion of House Finch disease, with photos.
• Project Feeder Watch
• Suite 101 article
• Stewardship Garden. A goldfinch suffering from the disease.
• A DC Birding Blog. Feeders and disease.

Dressed in scarlet, for the cold

For this house finch, a snack of black oil sunflower seeds goes down nicely on a chilly afternoon.

"And now, I must be off. Thanks!"

Finch and Thunderbird

Seen in a Strathcona alley:

The background is this building:

On the edge of Chinatown.

Poor little redhead!

This will be a sad post, and if gruesome photos disturb you, you're better off to skip it and go on over to The Birdchaser, I and the Bird #96, for a cheerful oyster hunt.

I wrote, last Monday, about the house finch with an infected eye who stayed on the chickadee feeder after dark, until I chased him off. This is an update on his condition.

He was back on the feeder Monday night, and I had to wave my hands around near him to get him to leave and find a warmer site for the night.

Tuesday morning he was back, poking around the place where the bucket of seed usually is, and squalling at me when he didn't find it. A bit later, I found him sitting on the chickadee feeder perch, sleeping; I woke him up, but he stayed put. This time, the flash didn't scare him off, either.


He looks almost normal. Except for a bit of crustiness around the eye, and his sleepiness and lack of concern at my approach, he seemed ok. When I finally got him to leave, by shaking the feeder with a stick, he was navigating fine.

He wanted to spend the night at the feeder again. I wouldn't let him.

Wednesday was a repeat; begging for food, sleeping on the chickadee feeder.

Thursday. In the morning, there was an outburst of chirps and squeals; I went to see what was up. A chickadee was on one arm of the feeder, the house finch on another. A pine siskin was attacking him, beak to beak, the two of them yelling as they jabbed at each other. The pine siskin saw me and left, and the finch began digging for a black oil seed. Good! He's got some energy, and he's eating!

Dark photo because it's pouring rain.

He stayed put most of the morning, sometimes eating, sometimes sleeping. A couple of times, I rousted him out, once prodding him with a stick to make him leave the perch, but he always came right back.

I got a chance for a close examination. What I saw was not encouraging.

The right eye (from his point of view; on the left in the photo) looks more or less normal. But even from a front view, the left side is swollen. And notice that spot below the eye. It was there, but not so pronounced, on Monday, too. (Look at the top photo again.)


But the left eye is a mess. And that spot looks like a hole. Or is it an abscess?

He flies ok, although he has a bit of difficulty coming in for a landing.


One of the symptoms of salmonellosis is diarrhea, with "pasted vents" as a sign of this. I had seen no evidence of this, yet, and he was cooperative, so I photographed his butt. Everything seems fine. No smearing, no "pasting". But look at the feet:


One talon is badly inflamed. Poor guy; sore from head to toe.

So, now I'm wondering. Maybe it's not salmonellosis. I hope not, though I'm still taking precautions (bleaching everything, every day). Could it be House Finch Disease?

Birds infected with this disease (also called mycoplasmal conjunctivitis) appear to have red, swollen, runny, or crusty eyes; in extreme cases the eyes become swollen shut or crusted over, and the bird becomes blind and unable to fend for itself. You might observe an infected bird sitting quietly in your yard, clumsily scratching an eye against its foot or a tree. While some infected birds recover, many die from starvation, exposure, or predation.

And will he recover? I do hope so; at least, he shouldn't starve. He was eating well.

Or is this, seeing that his foot is also damaged, a result of an accident or a run-in with a predator?

Life is so difficult for these little ones, so surrounded by dangers and so alone. We see them bouncing around, singing, flying, preening, splashing merrily in the bath; they look happy, and we don't often notice their frailty.

Little red finch, I'm rooting for you. I'd help more if I could.

(And now, to cheer yourself up, go on over to The Birdchaser.)

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Salmonellosis in house finch?

This house finch fell asleep on the feeder. When I went to close the curtains after dark, I discovered him, just a dark blob where there shouldn't be one, and opened the window, a bare two feet away. He didn't wake up, so I got the camera.


The first photo, a face shot, didn't turn out because the feeder was swinging in the wind. The second woke him up, and he left. I hope he found a better place to sleep.

One of my finches has something wrong with one eye. It was swollen shut a week ago; today I saw it again, and it is looking much better, but the eye is open a mere slit. I'm wondering if this is the same finch; I can't tell from the back.

I am worried about this bird; there is a possibility that he is suffering from salmonellosis, which attacks the eyes. I found the symptoms on the Wild Birds Unlimited website:

If you have Pine Siskin, American Goldfinch or House Finch at your feeders showing symptoms of salmonellosis, these are the symptoms. They include droopiness, diarrhea, and severe lethargy, fluffed out feathers and birds are easy to approach. Some birds may appear severely emaciated or be observed to seizure.

I have seen none of this, unless sleeping on the feeder tonight was a result of the "severe lethargy". Otherwise, the finch seems happy and active enough.

The Cornell Ornithology Lab mentions the swollen eyelids and lethargy. Another symptom to watch for seems to be "pasted vents". I have not seen this.

They also describe House Finch Disease, which causes swollen eyes, sometimes leading to the death of the finch.

What to do? Again, from WBU:

What to do if you find any sick birds
1. Remove all feeders for a few days.
2. Clean and sanitize all feeders, poles and the feeding area
3. Reinstall multiple feeders in new locations that are spread far apart from one another. Reducing crowding at feeders helps reduce stress and the transmission of the disease.
4. Replace wooden feeders with ones made of plastic or recycled materials. Wood is very difficult to sanitize.
5. Do not reinstall feeders that allow contact between fecal material and food (such as platform or tray feeders)
6. Initially provide food and feeders that will not attract finches (suet, safflower, peanuts, hummingbird feeders, etc.)
7. Reinstall finch feeders and food after an additional two weeks.
8. Clean feeders and birdbaths with a 10% bleach solution several times a week, be sure that feeders are dry before filling them with seed.

I cleaned all the feeders with hot water, then bleach, last week, and removed the bucket the finches use, and the bowl of nyger seed. I don't use a platform feeder. The chickadee feeder gets sanitized and thoroughly dried every few days. Tomorrow, I'll bleach the perches on the chickadee feeder again, and start looking for plastic to replace the wooden chopstick. I'll bleach the bird bath while I'm at it: I didn't do that last week, since it was frozen solid until yesterday.

Looking for info, I discovered that Jayne, at Journey Through Grace, has an outbreak of salmonellosis in her pine siskins. Very sad; she has seen several dead and dying birds. I hope it doesn't come to that here.

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Random meanderings

The night is calm and clear. No snow, no rain, no wind. Nothing to shovel tomorrow.

My desk is clear; so is the calendar. The bills are paid. The next event is a whole week away.

Let-down time. De-stressing. And I wander around, picking things and ideas up, putting them down, unable to settle.

So here's a collection of random notes and randomly-chosen recent photos.

House finch, at my feeder today.

1. My oldest grand-daughter just announced her engagement. I'm not old enough for that!

Reflection of condominium tower in an office building, Metrotown. A couple of days ago.

2. The "Tumbledown Dairy" we photographed a couple of weeks ago collapsed in the snowstorm. Only the rear part is left standing.

Bench beside our walkway. Freshly upholstered.

3. My grandson gave me a book for Christmas; "Does Anything Eat Wasps?" by New Scientist. It is a collection of short answers to questions posed to the "Last Word" column of the magazine. It's light reading; the perfect bathroom book. I've been reading about how the British Isles are like a teeter-totter (Scotland coming up, England sinking for now), how they get the bubbles in Aero chocolate bars, and how fast the wind has to be blowing to keep the mosquitoes from biting you. (That one, at least, is a useful bit of knowledge in BC.)

And the wasps? I have seen ants eating them, spiders do, too, frogs love them, birds ... What I found unexpected in the book was the story of a crab eating a wasp.

Orchid. Taken in IKEA, on Boxing Day. Not a great shot, but I was surprised that it came out at all.

4. Scruffy the squirrel dropped in today. She is fat! Really, really fat! Her fur is still dull and ratty and missing along the spine, but she bulges all over. It looks like someone has been very generous with food, now that the weather is so bad, and she has been taking full advantage of it.

It's a difficult winter for our wildlife; we feed some because they are cute or pretty, but others have to struggle to survive, in a climate that until now had been kindly. Many won't make it. Huckleberry described the plight of herons, the other day; the photograph of the mourning mate haunts me.

Sofia does Mastermind. Her rules. Last night.

5. I don't make New Year's Resolutions. That way, I don't break them. Good planning, huh?
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No wonder they won't pose!

Bad hairfeather day:

I've been trying, at intervals in the last few days, to take a photo of a red-headed house finch. With no luck; he's not interested. I am, and not only because he is so vibrantly coloured.

Today, I stood at the door, stock still, camera ready, all lights at my back off, pretending to be part of the door jamb. The redhead was in the feed bucket.

Normally, the finches jump in the bucket, grab a seed, hop up to the rim to deal with it, then drop back down for the next.

Cracking the seed.

"Red" was doing just that, when I turned on the camera. While he was down in the bucket, I positioned myself at the door. And waited for him to show up. And waited. And waited...

Meanwhile, a chickadee took a bath at the feeder to my right, a family of sparrows lined up on a branch of the rhododendron, another pair of finches was bouncing around at the edge of my vision. Photo-ops galore, and I stood focussing on a bare rim of a tin bucket.

Five minutes went by. Six, seven. No Red.

I eventually decided that he must have left while I was distracted by the chickadee (I was? I was sure I had kept my eyes on that bucket the whole time. But maybe I had lost concentration for that necessary split-second.) I gave up and walked over to peer in the bucket.

And Red blasted out of the bucket and away. I think he was laughing.

I did get a shot at him later, at a distance and with the wrong background:

The red topknot almost disappears against the dirt.

A couple of weeks ago, this bird was smooth and beautiful. Now, he looks scruffy. His head is knobbly, there are bald spots, and the feathers stick out at odd angles. I have been trying to get a close-up to see if I can determine whether he is just molting, or if there is a mite infestation problem to worry about.

The chickadees are all looking good, but some of my other finches are showing signs of wear.

Looks like it's been in a fight. A feather-pulling fight.


Zooming 'way in, same bird. Bare spots on head and neck.


Wearing a Mohawk.


This one looks good.

I'm beginning to understand their reluctance to smile for the camera.
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Bedtime ritual, interrupted

It was warm yesterday evening, and we sat outside, watching the sun go down. We had company; a busyness of chickadees, a towhee, a wren, swallows far overhead, mosquitos around our ankles, and a family of house finches:

Papa, standing guard

On a lower branch, checking out those intruders; is it safe to go down for our baths?

They waited until we had gone inside, then they brought the kids down for a quick dip before bed.
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And Baby makes Three

At my window yesterday afternoon:

House finches

Very new, very trembly chick.

I'm hungry, Mommy!
(Note: he'd barely had time to swallow a big mouthful. Like a little kid; wants "one in dis hand, one in dis hand, and one in me mouf.")

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