A couple of years ago, I bought
dried mealworms to entice the bluebirds in our yard to stick around. The
bluebirds didn’t take to them and frankly, I wasn’t surprised. What bird would
want to eat a dried-up worm? I don’t buy mealworms anymore.
On one of our first shopping trips, I bought seeds rings for the birds.
Saw that one of them I had grabbed had dried mealworms in it, but also lots of
other things like various seeds and nuts, so I wasn’t too concerned that it
wouldn’t get eaten. I put that one out first; there’s not currently a place to
hang it on the tree, so it’s been just sitting on the picnic table. I checked
it tonight and was amazed to see that the sparrows and woodpeckers who’ve been
very busy eating at it have picked out all the mealworms! Worm shaped holes
poked in and around the seeds and nuts. What?!
Then I found this info online: Dried
mealworms are a highly nutritious, convenient, and popular food source for
many wild bird species, especially insect-eaters
like bluebirds, robins, starlings, and chickadees. They are particularly useful
for providing essential protein during winter, nesting, and molting seasons. Huh!
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Our plan was to get up early and go back to Sweetwater
Wetlands again. Told Kim I didn’t need an alarm…the birds would wake me up.
Sure enough, I was up before 7 a.m., but instead of waking Kim up, I quietly
went out to my office and finished reading my book. Last night, I put it down
reluctantly because I knew an important plot development was coming up. Didn’t affect my sleep any but I had to
finish it today.
We left for Sweetwater about 10:15 a.m…sure, it was a little later than
we intended but sometimes that’s how we roll. Arrived to find the parking area
full again….Oh, wait, there are two spots. I’m sure we can fit in one of them.
Go out and come back around.
We’ve never encountered this parking issue before
and now it’s been two days in a row. There’s about eight parking spots at the
entrance with an overflow across the road. We’ve always been able to park in
the front eight and there’d be maybe three vehicles in the other lot. Wondered
if some rare, exotic bird had been sighted and the birding community had spread
the word. Nope, mostly a bunch of senior
citizens out looking for birds…and we qualify for that category, too.
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It was a short-sleeved day, for sure…with the sleeves pulled up. Don’t
know what the temperature was during our time at Sweetwater, but it was warm.
The kind of warm that makes one sweat. The truck read 73o when we
arrived, and on the way back to camp, it read 84o. So, temperature
was somewhere between those two numbers.
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Had a nice walk around the ponds. Saw the usual ducks doing the things
that ducks do. Teals, mallards, coots, widgeons, shovelers, etc., were
swimming, sunning, diving, preening and flying.
Ponds aren’t the only places to birdwatch. There are trees around the
entire facility and some between ponds, also. Spent a good deal of time looking
up to see what might be in a tree. I think I saw a vermillion flycatcher, but
it was too darn antsy to sit on one branch too long. And it’s hard to find a tiny bird in a tree
in the camera’s viewfinder. I did get a couple of not so stellar pictures that make
me think it was a flycatcher.
Turtles, frogs and dragonflies also hang out at Sweetwater. Lots of
dragonflies zipping by us at the ponds. They move fast and don’t land for long.
But I was able to get pictures of two kinds…a slender bright blue one that I
believe is a Western Pondhawk and a larger reddish one called a Red Saddlebags.
Heard a repetitive call ringing out that caught our attention. Kim
tracked it to a male quail sitting in a tree letting the covey know that there
was danger about…probably warning them about us. It was difficult to get a
clear picture of him, so I edged slowly a few steps closer and over for a
better view. He held his post, calling out to the others. I was impressed.
One year, at a different campsite, we watched a hummingbird build a nest
in a tree right next to our trailer. We had a bird’s eye view of the process,
no pun intended. I have to say that the nest we saw today appeared to be much
sturdier than the one we watched being built. Perhaps that’s the result of
experience. To get a sense of the size of the nest, stand a chicken egg on end
and imagine it cut in half horizontally. One half of that egg is approximately
the size of a hummingbird nest. Also,
when I was looking to see what newborn hummingbirds are called (nestlings,
chicks, or hatchlings), I learned that because the hummingbird incorporates
spider silk into the nest, it has the ability to stretch as the chicks grow. Ingenious!
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Despite my misgivings about birds and dried mealworms, we bought some
today, along with a platform feeder. I put the thistle seeds away; the finches
that come to the yard don’t seem to notice it. The finches back home will
appreciate it. I also put the peanut butter ball feeder away, but just the
feeder. I smashed up the balls to put on the platform feeder. There are three types of bird feed on the
platform feeder: mealworms, a seed variety and peanut butter ball crumbs. It’ll
be interesting to watch who visits and what they prefer.
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We’ve shown great restraint by waiting a whole week before stopping at
Hot Dogs Alvarado to get a Sonoran Hot Dog. Kim decided on the way back to camp
that today was the day to stop at our favorite food truck. Good decision!
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Kim’s guiding scope was off last night so he scraped most of his images. However, he’s hopeful he fixed the problem and is out imaging the Rosette Nebula again tonight. I’m grateful that the sky is clear again. What we’ve experienced so far this past week is more like cloudy Michigan skies instead of typical clear Arizona skies. Forecast shows that last night and tonight are the only two clear nights expected for the next week.
