Backyard Birds Liven your Life

May 16th, 2009 by admin

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No other day has been as fantastic as my first day of birdwatching.Angry seagulls directly overhead spelled trouble for me. My brother tossed a frisbee at the seagulls and I dodged.

I was wearing my Dad’s binoculars on a strap around my neck. It is a good thing I did not realize the value of those binoculars or it would have made me nervous. When we lived in New Jersey in the city, we went to the “shore” once a year for Dad’s vacation.

The primary birds we saw at the beach were seagulls, terns and sandpipers. Dad let me use his binoculars even though they were his special prized possession, Leupold binoculars. He liked to watch the boats at sea. My brother’s delight was watching girls with those binoculars. Of course, he was young as well!) I enjoyed the birds at the beach and the bay because they were so different from the ones in the city at home.

My yard had normal city birds like starlings, sparrows, pigeons and once in a while bluejays and a winter cardinal. Because all of these birds were accustomed to people we did not use binoculars at home. Oh yes, we had bluejays too. Grandma often scolded them for chasing the smaller birds away.

When we were driving every Sunday afternoon in the country, Dad pointed out some hawks and buzzards in the sky but I did not yet know how to tell them apart. Dad explained. Buzzards eat dead meat, like in the cowboy movies. Hawks are predators and rabbits are one of their favored meals. Ah, but i still did not know how to identify them. It was Grandma who told me I needed to save my allowance to buy a book to identify birds like bird guides.

Dad did not often take the Leupold binoculars out for a regular drive. Only when we went to a lake or beach. We saw swallows over the water near the cliffs on one trip. I was on the other side of the car the day Mom saw a meadowlark. Funny. Not until years later as an adult did I see my first meadowlark. By then I understood the value and importance of both birding guides and those incredible Leupold binoculars.