Summer is disappearing fast. I can tell because not only are winter coats starting to appear in the clothing stores (!), but some of the birds are already starting to migrate. I have at least 3 female Ruby-throated Hummingbirds sipping nectar from my flowers every day, and I’ve already been visited by the first flock of those annoying Common Grackles.
As I write this, a Red-winged Blackbird is sitting on one of my feeders eating millet. I’m not a big fan of blackbirds of any kind, but this one is being particularly polite. He’s eating his food one seed at a time and not flinging it all over the ground like some of his irksome relatives, so for now I’m letting him enjoy his meal in peace.
Red-winged Blackbirds are short-distant migrants or they stay year-round in much of the United States. In southern Wisconsin the birds arrive in early spring and depart again in late summer. Perhaps they only go a little further south to Illinois. All I know is I’ve never seen Red-winged Blackbirds here in the winter, and people get really excited to see them in the spring after our long bout of cold and snow.