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Tips for Spring Birds - Spring Bird Photography Made Easy

Winter Birds Offer Great BirdCam Wild Bird Photos

How to Prevent Birds from Flying into Windows

Audubon Tips for Attracting Songbirds

Interview with BirdCam User David Lindquist

BirdCam Positioning – Placing Your BirdCam for Backyard Bird Photography

The BirdCam – A Great Garden Gift, Nature Gift, Bird Lover Gift

Bringing the Birds Back to Hershey Gardens

BirdCam In Panama with BirdChick

The Top 20 Wingcapes Photos of 2011

The King of The Quest

Kids and Senior Citizens Come Together Over Gardening and Bird Watching

Cameras for Classrooms Allow Teachers to Introduce Kids to Nature and Learning

Spring Bird Photography – Nesting

Hummingbird Facts—Feeding Hummingbirds, Hummingbird Nesting, Hummingbird Pictures

Saving the Allegheny Woodrat

The Top Wingscapes Photos of 2012

Donors See Their Impact on Haiti Via Time Lapse Videos

Wingscapes New Website Features

Wingscapes Facebook Caption Contest

Wingscapes - Tips for E-Mailing Digital Birdcam Photos

Urban Greening on the Go

Surveilling the Society of Snakes with Time Lapse Cameras

This hungry Carolian Wren made for a great picture Winter – for many bird species, it’s the time of the year when food is in shortest supply. Because of this, well-stocked feeders become veritable bird magnets, drawing in almost every species of hungry bird in the area. BirdCam enthusiasts can use this high level of feeder visitation to their advantage by keeping their bird cameras focused on prime feeding locations...
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Feeding the Birds - Cooper's Hawk Talk to any sales clerk at a backyard bird supply store long enough and you're likely to hear the story about the new customer who wanted to start feeding the birds in their backyard; so they bought a feeder and some seed, and went home happy. However about two weeks later the same customer called back quite upset. Whenever there was...
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Attracting Birds to Your Birdbath Savvy bird watchers know that while many backyard visiting birds will come to a well-maintained and continually stocked feeder, just about all the birds in the area, whether regular feeder visitors or not, will make use of a bird bath filled with clean water. Adding a “jiggler” or a drip feature makes such a bird bath even more appealing. Gray Catbird,...
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You'll Really Be Surprised If you haven’t stopped by the Wingscapes BirdCam Photo Gallery lately, you'll be quite amazed at the variety of species you can now find there. In addition to some great images, all recorded using the Wingscapes BirdCam and submitted to the site by proud BirdCam owners, of all the most popular feeder-visiting bird species, you will likely find a few surprises as...
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Keeping Cats Indoors Helps Protect Both Cats and Wildlife Yes, they’re cute. Yes, they make wonderful pets. But when allowed to roam at large, they can become a threat to not only the local wildlife but themselves as well. We’re of course talking about Felis catus - the common house cat. It’s simple really; cats hunt. They’re not being mean - as natural and highly effective predators, it’s how they...
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Popular Feeder Birds: Chestnut-backed Chickadee Ask almost any bird watcher what their favorite bird is and odds are that one or another member of the chickadee family will be mentioned more than most other species. While the Black-capped Chickadee is perhaps the most common of the chickadees across the United States and Canada, the Chestnut-backed Chickadee is one which many bird watchers would love to...
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You Think Your Kid Has a Funny Haircut? As June began to wane toward July, I’d been noticing that the iron hook by which I hang the nut feeder from our deck was even more popular than the contents of the nut feeder itself. So I repositioned the Wingscapes BirdCam from focusing on the feeder to focusing on the top curve of the iron feeder hook where most...
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Clay-colored Robin! For birders, the Clay-colored Robin is one of those special birds that when added to one’s life list gives a little more satisfaction than the average life bird. In the U.S., the Clay-colored Robin is generally only found in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley, which is where thousands of birders flock each year to see it and other “valley specialties.” However...
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Suet Brings in the Birds of Autumn With the autumn progressing, the colder days are increasing the popularity of suet among many of the feeder-visiting birds. Here in the Pacific Northwest, the Western Scrub-jays are becoming quite regular visitors to the feeders after their usual summer absence during which they forage far and wide among the lowland fields. However the plentiful and quick calories provided from suet...
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Full Frame Flicker A question that is often asked about the Wingscapes BirdCam is “How close can you position the BirdCam to a feeder and still get a clear image?” The answer is 18 inches. At this close distance, images of some birds visiting the feeder will almost fill the entire frame. I had the BirdCam set at just a shade over...
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A Refreshing Drink While many BirdCam owners prefer to focus their cameras directly on their favorite bird feeders, there are a number of other possible placements that can be equally as successful for recording some amazing images from the daily life of your backyard-visiting birds. One great option, shown here in this image of a White-throated Sparrow uploaded to the Wingscapes Flickr group...
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Of Garden Poles and Grosbeaks You have a great bird feeder set up in the back yard. You are seeing some superb birds visiting the feeder. You want to set up the Wingscapes BirdCam to capture what you are sure will be some stunning images of the birds visiting the feeder, but there is a problem. The post to which the feeder is attached...
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Just Off Main Street There’s a famous old saying that states “You do your best business on Main Street.” While generally good advice, when it comes to photographing birds you can often get some great images just off “Main Street” as well. Take this image uploaded to the Wingscapes BirdCam Photo Gallery by Harold of Jackson, Tennessee of a Northern Cardinal sitting on the...
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BirdCam User's Video ID Quiz ...from our series "Catching up the Items to Blog Backlog"... The Wandering Tattler, posted some great video clips of different birds he sees at his feeder.  Can you identify all of the different birds in the below video? Thanks Paul! Paul Writes: With a 2 Gig memory card the BirdCam was able to capture almost 200 videos spanning the entire day today. I focused it...
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Twisted Flicker The Northern Flickers are back in northwest Oregon. After their normal brief early summer absence, single birds are now beginning to be seen in the area. This is the time of year when they tend to spend more time on the ground feeding on ants, however occasionally they will still be seen visiting feeders. While the flicker in this...
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Absolutely Brilliant Woodpecker In the U.S., calling something "brilliant" usually means that it's shiny or bright; however in England, "brilliant" is also a commonly used term meaning "fantastic" or "superb" - which is exactly what we called this image of a Great Spotted Woodpecker.    Submitted, along with quite a few other, well... brilliant images, to the Wingscapes BirdCam Photo Gallery by Tony from Yeovil,...
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Testing At Carpenter I did some more testing with the camera at Carpenter Nature Center today.  I find that it's taking some practice on my part for finding the best light to get the best shot of the birds.  I have the option of having the camera take a few photos or several photos at once, but find that I like it taking...
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Cool Woodpecker Shots Here's another woodpecker shot from testing at Carpenter. I love this shot of a male downy woodpecker.  He looks as if he is saying, "You lookin' at me?  Yeah, I'm banging this suet, you wanna make somethin' of it?"  Actually, what I think is really going on is that the downy has just landed on the feeder and is getting his...
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Intergrade Flickers from Colorado Connie from Loveland, Colorado, has been gracing the Team Wingscapes e-mail box with some great images she has been recording of the birds visiting her backyard feeders. "I have many Northern Flickers and the [BirdCam] is helping me discover just how may are intergrades. Here are a couple of shots of one male intergrade that visits regularly." (An intergrade flicker is...
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Resourceful Sparrow Birds are remarkably resourceful. Take, for example, this BirdCam-recorded image of a Chipping Sparrow submitted to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery by our friend David from Cary, North Carolina. You might notice that the feeder on which it is perched is not the type normally frequented by sparrows. However, as David reports, the ant moat on this hummingbird feeder has proven...
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Summertime Jewels Remembered Wingscapes Photo Gallery all-star contributor David from North Carolina recently uploaded a few photos of the Ruby-throated Hummingbirds that visited one of his feeders this past summer. This being the darkest period of winter throughout much of the northern hemisphere, images of these little summertime jewels are indeed a welcome sight. David noted that the series of BirdCam images in which...
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Handy Photographer's Trick While feeders and bird baths make wonderful backgrounds in bird photos, sometimes you just want something different. Bird photographers have long struggled with getting the bird they want to photograph to land in just the right place to obtain the best background scene for their photos – so they developed a trick to help them do so. As this...
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Picture Perfect Hummingbird As most any experienced photographer will tell you, the background of a good photograph is just as important as the subject itself. That’s why when setting up a Wingscapes BirdCam, it’s a good idea to step back and consider what will be seen in the picture behind that prize-winning image of one of your feeder-visiting birds. Glenna from Mississauga, Ontario, Canada...
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Duck-billed Chickadee? As the fall football season is getting underway in Oregon, graduates of both the University of Oregon and Oregon State University are beginning to hang out their respective duck and beaver mascot flags as well as donning their green and yellow or black and orange clothing in support of their preferred team. Now it seems even the local feeder-visiting birds...
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Speaking of Pine Siskins... By far, the most commonly seen bird visiting the feeder set up by the representatives of Swarovski Optik at the ABA convention at Snowbird were the Pine Siskins. They dominated the feeder and while generally content to sit and much the hulled sunflower hearts for long periods of time, they could also become quite feisty when a newcomer approached. In...
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First Bird of 2008 in Scappoose, Oregon ...from our series "Catching up the Items to Blog Backlog"... John, from Scappoose, Oregon also known as the Born again Bird Watcher writes a blog regarding the "First Bird" he sees in 2008 Great Shot! Thanks John. John Writes: As I walked into the kitchen this morning, I had a feeling that the first bird of the year was already awaiting me just...
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Clever Wren One of the benefits of having a Wingscapes BirdCam constantly watching your feeders is the amazing behaviors you can discover about the birds you thought you already knew pretty well. Take this image of a Carolina Wren recently uploaded to the Wingscapes BirdCam Photo Gallery by our friend David from Cary, NC for example. Carolina Wrens are not generally known to...
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Finch Video from the ABA Convention As the good people at Swarovski Optik went to the trouble to set up a feeder at the American Birding Association in Snowbird, Utah to demonstrate their fine selection of digiscoping equipment, it seemed a shame not to attach a Wingscapes BirdCam to it as well in order to record the various birds visiting throughout the day. As they welcomed...
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Spying on My Birds!?! Laura from, Laura's Birding Blog, posted this and claims she is spying on her birds with her "spiffy little BirdCam." We look forward to more great posts and pictures from Laura. Laura writes: "I set out a feeder on my balcony Friday, but didn't have any visitors until Sunday. Even more birds showed up Monday, and every day this week I've added...
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Waxwings - Wingscapes' Most Wanted! It is worth noting that during this experiment with the Eye-Fi card (see previous post), I added another species to the BirdCam's life-list: the Cedar Waxwing. This is one of my favorite birds, and along with the Northern Flicker, it is one that I've wanted badly to capture with the BirdCam. While both happen through our yard every winter, neither...
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Squirrel Pod After receiving a new bird feeder as a gift from a friend, I was eager to get it in place and the Wingscapes BirdCam focused on it. The shape and color of the feeder promised to offer great possibilities for somewhat more artistic images of the local birdlife. Unfortunately I didn’t give full consideration to just who else might find...
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Get Your BirdCam Ready for Winter-time Visitors With winter approaching and the snow already beginning to fall in some of the more northerly parts of the world, many people are beginning to put their gardens (often including their bird feeders) “to bed” until preparations for spring are begun. However savvy BirdCam users, such as Edgar from Corbin, Kentucky who uploaded this lovely BirdCam image of a Northern Cardinal...
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Peek-a-squirrel While many Wingscapes BirdCam users find their feeders and ponds to be the most active places upon which to focus their cameras, other areas commonly found in back yards or elsewhere on a property can also be remarkably active when it comes to wildlife; wood piles, for example. Birdcam footage of squirrel from RSPB online shop on Vimeo. Woodpiles provide sources of...
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What Are These Blue Jays Thinking? When it comes to birds showing what look like human expressions, it’s hard to find a species more adept at it than the Blue Jay. From surprise to curiosity to annoyance, just about anyone who has ever looked closely at the vividly patterned face of one of these birds has at one time or another likely been struck by just...
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British Bird Table Parade Our friends at The Horticultural Channel in London, England have really provided us with quite a parade of birds visiting their bird table that they’ve recorded using a Wingscapes Audubon BirdCam. From the sweet-singing Blackbirds to the proverbially cheeky Robins to a squirrel helpfully giving the camera’s lens a quick “cleaning,” a good selection of the most common garden bird table...
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Really Blue Jay Honestly, have you ever seen so many shades of blue on a single bird? Given their raucous ways, many people who live in areas inhabited by Blue Jays may not always stop and consider what truly beautiful birds they truly are. Then again, many people might not get the chance to really do so as they go flashing through the yard,...
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Autumn Cleaning for Winter Wildlife With the leaves beginning to turn and a chill in the early morning air, it’s clear that autumn is certainly approaching. Unlike spring - when most backyard nature enthusiasts undertake extensive cleaning projects to get everything in shape for the growing season as well as the return of migratory birds, autumn more often than not elicits thoughts of “wrapping everything...
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Angry Hummingbirds As summer shifts into autumn, the hummingbirds being seen in the Pacific Northwest are likewise shifting from Rufous Hummingbirds to Anna’s Hummingbirds. As Anna’s Hummingbirds will over-winter in the mild maritime climate of the western regions of Oregon and Washington, backyard nature enthusiasts there keep their nectar feeders stocked and their Wingscapes BirdCams focused on them year-round. Given the deep pink to violet...
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Yes, There Will Be A Quiz After the Film We’re so excited about how much the revolutionary new Wingscapes AutoFeeder will add to your enjoyment of feeding and watching your backyard birds that we’re not just going to show you a short film about it, we’re going to quiz you on it afterwards. You’ll want to pay close attention, of course, because if you do well on the quiz you’ll...
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Coonskin Cap You have to admit, at first glance this BirdCam 2.0 image of a pair of night-time visitors to the bird feeders in Sandy’s Exeter, Pennsylvania backyard looks more than just a bit like a lone deer with a Davy Crockett fixation. This isn’t the case, of course; very few deer actually wear coonskin caps. It does make for an interesting image,...
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The Popular Nuthatch Of all North America’s “winter-time birds” few are as fun to watch as they come and go from feeders as the nuthatches. With their active feeding habits and unusual “head down” perching posture, these stumpy little birds quickly capture the attention - and hearts - of backyard nature enthusiasts as they repeatedly fly in, grab a seed or bit of...
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Assembling the AutoFeeder is a Snap! If you were lucky enough to unwrap a Wingscapes AutoFeeder this holiday season, congratulations! We hope you’ll be delighted with all the many advantages it offers over traditional bird feeders. While we know that some new owners have already unpacked, assembled, and put their new AutoFeeders into operation already, we also know how busy and filled with activities the holidays can...
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Do Not Adjust the Color of Your Monitor For those living in North America, do not adjust the color settings of your computer monitor - for while these two birds may look like the chickadees and goldfinches that commonly visit your own feeders, they are in fact the European cousins of those familiar birds. Very familiar to all those who feed birds in England and continental Europe, Great Tits...
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Painted Bunting Added to the BirdCam Life List Dan, from the Nervous Birds blog points out an excellent feature of the BirdCam - the ability to capture images of birds that visit feeders while you're away. He was able to photograph this superb Painted Bunting. As these are the first Painted Bunting photos taken with the BirdCam that have been reported to us, it has been added to...
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Oh the Birds You'll See! John, from Scappoose, Oregon and the author of the Born Again Bird Watcher blog, wrote this review of the BirdCam. John, thank you for trying out the BirdCam and for writing a great review! John writes: "For years, when it came to remote, motion triggered, observation cameras, I was dubious. I had seen many, some quite good, others (and quite frankly most)...
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Winter Visitors On Their Way Although summer has not quite yet left us, evidence that the autumn migration is well underway is being seen all throughout the country. Soon many of our favorite spring and summer feeder visiting birds will be replaced by species that overwinter in our respective areas. Amy from Chicago reminded us of one of the more exciting wintertime birds that often extend...
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Belted Kingfisher footage on YouTube Before thanksgiving, I wrote that I was going to try and get good BirdCam images of a Belted Kingfisher that lives at my in-law's lake place. I'm pleased to report that the BirdCam succeeded and I've uploaded some great footage of a female Belted Kingfisher to YouTube. Watch as she bangs this little fish she caught against the side of...
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The Mystery of the Nuthatch Another of the autumn birds increasing in visibility at the suet feeders in preparation for winter is the Red-breasted Nuthatch. One of the easiest to recognize and most beloved species of North American feeder-visiting birds, the nuthatch is readily identifiable by its odd head-down vertical posture. The reason for this unusual perching position is not fully understood, however it may...
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Tough Seed to Crack for a Pine Siskin Pine Siskins are a bit of a vagabond species; ornithologists call them “irruptive.” For avid feeders of birds, this simply means that some years you see a lot of them and in others hardly any. We’ve seen a few in Scappoose so far this autumn; neither more nor less than average. However we were very surprised to discover this...
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Reflective-Wren When it comes to birds in which we can most easily see our own sentiments and feelings reflected, few can rival wrens. Take this image of a Carolina Wren, uploaded to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery by BirdCam user Barbara of Dumfries, Virginia, for example. Who could not, upon seeing this little wren striking such an expressive pose, begin to imagine...
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BirdCam Makes National TV Debut! The BirdCam was featured on the Martha Stewart show last Friday as part of a segment on backyard birding. Dr. Stephen Kress was on discussing bird feeders and ways to enjoy birding at home.  Martha herself has been using the BirdCam, and showed some of her own photos on the show. If you missed the episode, don't worry - they've posted...
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Christian Science Monitor Reviews the BirdCam The diggin' it blog on the Christian Science Monitor site featured a review of the BirdCam yesterday. Blogger Judy Lowe writes, "It’s a fabulous product for anyone who loves to watch birds.  It would make a great gift for your favorite bird-watcher."

Coolest Starling Photo Ever So, Bart has me testing out a camera prototype and I got the coolest photo of a starling!  I know, I know what you're thinking, "Sharon, you over estimate a person's interest in starlings." Perhaps. But, when I worked at a bird store, I can't tell you the number of people who would come in with blurred photos in the winter of...
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Chasingame.com Reviews the BirdCam Chasingame.com is perhaps the best resource on the web for reviews of all motion-activated game cameras. They began reviewing the Wingscapes BirdCam in December 2007. Below is an update to their original review... 02-27-2008 update:  We have had this cam setup on a neighbors feeder for a while trying to capture a picture of a never seen before in the area...
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Just Posted - David L.'s Tips and Tricks for BirdCammers You've probably heard us mention David Lindquist before. He's one of our most active BirdCam users, and has contributed some really beautiful photos to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery. David has 22 bird feeders set up in his backyard in Cary, North Carolina, and has used his BirdCam to track bird behavior patterns. We convinced David to share some of his...
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Warblers Are Tricky Birds to Identify I think we can all agree on one thing - warblers are tricky. Not only are all but the brightly-colored breeding plumage males tricky to identify, the rapid furtive movements of most warbler species make them tricky even to view long enough to get a good look at in the first place. Male American Redstart Warbler However by placing a BirdCam 2.0...
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Bright Eyed and Bushy Tailed Squirrels Of all the common backyard wildlife, flying squirrels are perhaps the most elusive. While fairly common throughout North America, as might be quickly assumed by their enormous - and highly reflective - eyes, they are active only at night and thus are largely unseen by even the most avid wildlife watchers. Squirrel However Rebecca of Columbia, Maryland used her BirdCam 2.0 with...
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If You Build It, Three Carolina Wrens Will Come As every successful restaurant owner knows, when you’ve got the right location, create an enticing ambiance, and - most important of all - serve delicious food, customers will pack the place to the walls. Three Carolina Wrens We don’t know if Paul from Cove, Texas has ever owned a restaurant (we do know, however, that he manages the Wild Birds Unlimited store...
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Rough Customers -- Young Cooper’s Hawks Hanging Out When most of us look out our respective windows at our backyard bird baths or feeders, we generally expect to see the usual assortment of local sparrows, finches, and wrens - birds that are, if not always the most colorful, generally more or less cute, and certainly not classifiable as “lethal.” We certainly wouldn’t expect to see what the BirdCam 2.0...
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Color Coordinated Baltimore Oriole So far as we know, there is no scientific study indicating that birds choose feeders based upon how well they match the color of their own feathers. However if such a preference does in fact exist, then this Baltimore Oriole photographed by Phil in Maple Grove, Minnesota using a BirdCam 2.0 is certainly demonstrating a superb sense of color coordination. Color...
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It All Came Together for This Male Ruby-throated Hummingbird Photo Let’s face it, while all Wingscapes cameras are designed to be easy to use successfully, some images and videos recorded by them will be - due to variations in light, movement of the subject, etc. - better than others. However when all the possible variables that can influence a picture come together in the best possible way, the results are...
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The Male Rose-breasted Grosbeak: Nature's Best Dressed Bird With its deep black wings, brilliant white body, and a red “cravat” across it’s chest so vivid that it could make most flowers pale in comparison, there are few birds that give a more formally dressed appearance than the male Rose-breasted Grosbeak. One of these dapper fellows paid a visit, wearing his Sunday Best, of course, to Ferddie2009’s feeders this past...
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British Icons - Iconic garden birds of Great Britain When it comes to iconic garden birds of Great Britain, the Robin and the Blue Tit are right up at the top of both the “most well-known” and “most popular” lists. Yet despite both being commonly seen in back yards all across the Sceptred Isle, as well as colorfully depicted in artwork adorning everything from stamps to tea towels, they...
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The Possum in the Barn While most people have traditionally set-up their BirdCams near feeders and bird baths to record images and videos of the feathered visitors to their backyards, the addition to the Wingscapes product line of the BirdCam 2.0 with its built-in flash has opened wide the door of possibilities for a tremendous variety of other uses day or night, indoors or out.   Opossum Joe...
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The Thin Blue (Jay) Line To many who live in areas where Blue Jays are commonly seen, these raucous birds are often thought of in a somewhat less than affectionate manner. Given their noisy and frequently aggressive behavior toward smaller feeder-visiting birds, this is not a difficult to understand. However looking at the beautiful range of blues seen in the feathers of the jay shown in...
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This Birdfeeder Helps Bring Hummingbirds Together When it comes to feistiness in hummingbirds, the male of the Rufous Hummingbird species certainly qualifies for the top of most any list. These richly auburn and green little birds are well known among bird watchers throughout their Pacific Northwest range for not “working and playing well with others.” Once a male picks a feeder as his own, he will...
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No Mystery Why The Bald Eagle Nest Commands Attention There's simply something about eagles, especially Bald Eagles, that commands attention. Perhaps that is why the Decorah Eagles webcam, produced and maintained by the Raptor Research Project, has received over 32 million views since it has been online. Since 2007, users of our BirdCams have been recording bird nests in their own backyards. Our cameras have offered an amazing new...
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Birds Need Proper Jaw Alignment Too As we all know, regular dental check-ups keep our teeth healthy and in good working order. Birds, however, rarely visit dentists. Thus to keep their beaks - which are not only their teeth but their primary tools for both nest building and grooming, and which continue to grow throughout their lives - in good working order, they rely on their...
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Loggerhead Shrike is Quite the Butcher Of all the ways we’ve seen BirdCams mounted, we don’t recall previously seeing this clever “straight down the fence rail” position used by Adam from Dudley, North Carolina to capture this BirdCam-Life-List-enlarging image of a perched Loggerhead Shrike. Perched Loggerhead Shrike While not particularly menacing-looking birds, shrikes have been given the nickname “butcher birds” by those who know about their habit of...
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Grey Go-away-bird Photographed by BirdCam in South Africa “Go away! Go away!” That would be quite a surprising thing to hear as you stepped out your back door and into your garden one morning; however if you lived in South Africa you just might. Fortunately it wouldn’t be one of your human neighbors expressing a less than friendly sentiment but the call of the Grey Go-away-bird. The Go-away-bird, Corythaixoides...
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The Killdeer, a Small Bird with a Fierce Name You’d think that if you were going to give a bird a name like Killdeer that it would be some sort of giant eagle with a fifteen foot wingspan capable of swooping down on a herd of White-tails, snatching one of them up, and carrying it off to its nest high up on some lonely mountain. However as we can see...
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DA-DAH da-dah duh-duh da-dah… BatCam! Wingscapes' First Lesser Long-nosed Bats No, we didn’t add a special new bat-optimized camera to the Wingscapes product line-up; although judging from the number of bat photos we’ve been receiving lately from BirdCam 2.0 users, perhaps we should. This latest one, uploaded to the Photo Gallery by Dave form Tucson, Arizona, shows not one, not two, but three Lesser Long-nosed Bats making a nocturnal visit to...
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How the Wood Thrush Creates its Song In order to speak, humans rely on a laryx, or “voice box,” located in the throat to make the necessary sounds. Birds however, don’t have a larynx; they have something far more complex called a syrinx in their throats that allows them to produce the marvelous array of sounds of which they are capable. Because the syrinx has two chambers instead...
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With This Nut I Thee Wed The ability of the male to provide for the well-being of the female is a cornerstone requirement in the pair bonding of many bird species (not to mention more than a few mammalian ones as well). After all, the reproductive cycle of many birds requires the female to spend long periods of time incubating the eggs; time in which the...
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Like Water Off a Dove's Back In addition to giving birds the ability to fly, attract mates, and stay warm, feathers also help to keep them dry. Extending from the main shaft of each feather are barbs that are interlocked together by barbules and hooklets which, when all neatly aligned, form a tight weave. A light coating of oil produced by a gland near the bird’s...
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VIDEO!!! I've posted some great videos captured by the BirdCam prototype at a remote web page. We had always planned for the BirdCam to take both photos and video, but for some reason, I expected that the most common usage would be for still images. After having time to test the cameras and play with the video function, my mind has...
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Red Breasted Nuthatch Kathy Haigh of Wild Birds Unlimited in Billings, MT writes, "Here is a photo from our customer with his new Bird Cam."Thanks Kathy. Customer, please identify yourself! I've never seen a RBNU in Alabama, only their Brown-headed and White-breasted cousins.

BirdCam on Dr. Mobey's Lab Blog Dr. Mobey's Lab posted about the BirdCam in early February.  Maybe the BirdCam can help him find out what is under his deck... He writes: Check out this piece of gadgetry. the Wingscapes BirdCam. I may have to get one of these. They look like the camera traps they use on my least favorite cryptozoology show, MonsterQuest. This would really come in...
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Small Surpise While most people who set out and maintain bird feeders have a somewhat contentious relationship with their local squirrels, the same is generally not the case with chipmunks. Perhaps it’s the chipmunks’ smaller size, maybe it’s their almost genteel behavior; it could even be a lingering effect of our watching Chip and Dale cartoons as children – whatever the reason,...
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Feeding Frenzy The Houston Chronicle's Birdwoman shares some great platform feeder photos on her Backyard Birder blog. A variety of birds stopped by for a bite of black oil sunflower seeds, including mockingbirds, cardinals and a blue jay.  

Bird Bath Series from Fellow Blogger Amy from Chicago's Magnificent Frigatebird blog is always a good read, and I'm especially loving her great BirdCam photos of her backyard birdbath. Check out her series of a Robin bathing, as well as some hilarious shots of Mourning Doves and House Sparrows. Thanks, Amy!

Great Backyard Bird Count The Great Backyard Bird Count was this past weekend, and hopefully the BirdCam came in handy for those of you who participated. Birdwoman writes in her Houston Chronicle Backyard Birder Blog about how she set up her BirdCam to document her Bird Count list. Though the count is over, you can submit your checklist from now until March 1. So...
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Great BirdCam Videos The ability to take videos is one of the things that really sets the BirdCam apart. The video function gives us front row seats to all of the action, and the results are intriguing and often pretty funny! David L. took some of his videos a step further by adding titles and music. I've been browsing them on YouTube and...
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Urban Birds Funky Nests Contest Have a great photo of a peculiar nesting spot? The Celebrate Urban Birds citizen science project is taking submissions through July 31 for their Funky Nests in Funky Places contest. Submit an image of an unusual nest location (some of the current entries include nests in basketball goals, recycling bins and shoes!) and you could win one of several great...
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Make Your Yard A Better Bird Habitat Thanks to Dr. Stephen Kress of the Audubon Society for giving us his 10 Projects for Attracting More Songbirds. A renowned ornithologist, Dr. Kress is Director of the Seabird Restoration Project (check out some of his BirdCam photos in the Wingscapes Photo Gallery!) and author of The Audubon Society Guide to Attracting Birds.

What's Your Guess? Think for a moment about feathers. They provide birds with protection from the environment, enable them to fly (well, most of them at least), and identify them to one another – and to us as well. So when a bird molts, as it must do at least once each year to replace worn or damaged feathers, problems in all these...
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A Very Real Bird Indeed So bright is their coloration that whenever an image of a Painted Bunting is displayed, if there is any person present who has not previously seen or heard of them, one particular comment will almost certainly be heard: “That’s not a real bird; that’s an enhanced photo!” Wingscapes BirdCam Photo Gallery contributor “K” from Amelia Island, Florida was kind enough...
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Winter Birds in Scotland! We came across this great video from Scotland by "deepinthewoods" posted on LiveVideo.com. Note,...this was NOT taken by the Wingscapes BirdCam.

Update on the BirdCam Michelle, author of the blog The Northwest Nature Nut, wrote this great post offering tips on a good way to set up your BirdCam.  Great Shots! Thank you, Michelle! Michelle Writes: From today: Red-breasted Nuthatch and Bushtits on the feeder. The feeder has homemade suet crumbles and black-oil sunflower in it. I have been setting up my Wingscapes Bird Cam every day. I've been...
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The Birds of Which Dreams are Made Not long ago Team Wingscapes was thrilled by the submission of an image to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery showing a bird we dared not even hope for in a scene that took our breath away – a Laysan Albatross with a nest. Now Hob from Kauai, the generous BirdCam enthusiast who submitted the earlier albatross image has added to...
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New BirdCam Life List Bird - Pine Warbler! David from Cary, North Carolina has sent us more great shots! The photo he captured with the BirdCam of the Pine Warbler was the first known photo taken by the Wingscapes BirdCam of this species, so we added it to our Wingscapes Life List. Thanks David!  

Bottoms Up! Birds can be remarkably resourceful. Regardless of the obstacle, if there is something they need they will find a way to reach it. Take this American Goldfinch image recently submitted to the Wingscapes BirdCam Photo Gallery by BirdCam user extraordinaire David from Cary, NC. The goldfinch has realized that there is water to be found at the bottom of the...
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The Red Feather Dilemma One of the great dilemmas of nature is why some bird species display vivid or bold colors. Take the Summer Tanager for example. While the female is a soft yellow (as shown here by the superb photo recently recorded by David from Cary, NC using his Wingscapes BirdCam), the male is a vivid red. Ornithologists tell us that producing such...
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Some Amazing BirdCam Photos from Dr. Steven Kress The entire team at Wingscapes is very excited to have recently received a number of seabird images as recorded by the BirdCam used by none other than Dr. Steven Kress. For those not familiar with Dr. Kress, he is Vice President for Bird Conservation for the National Audubon Society and Manager of the Society's Maine Coast Seabird Sanctuaries. He is...
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Sharing the Joy While the Wingscapes team always enjoys receiving photos from enthusiastic Wingscapes BirdCam users, we also love to discover them posted on blogs and photo sharing websites. Bill of the Birds has done precisely that over at his blog of the same name. If you post some of your own BirdCam’s images on your blog, or perhaps on a social media...
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A Matter of Perspective The Born Again Bird Watcher posted this interesting article about size differences between the Varied Thrush and the Dark-eyed Junco.  He also captured the first photograph of a Varied Thrush with the BirdCam so we have added it to our BirdCam Life List. John Writes: As the juncos were joined by a group of Golden-crowned Sparrows (Zonotrichia atricapilla) this morning, I moved...
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Two New BirdCam Life List Birds Added from Oregon Check out these great shots sent in to us by Floyd in McMinnville, Oregon. The Yellow-rumped (Audubon's) Warbler and the Pine Siskin are the first photos submitted of these two species so we have added them to our BirdCam Life List. Floyd writes: ...photos taken by the BirdCam during the past week.  Still having fun with it.  

BirdCam Life List Reigning Champions Shirley and Wayne from Cottonwood, Arizona keep sending us great shots. These were some of their first photos! Here are a few of the pictures they have sent us that we have added to our BirdCam Life List.  They have also submitted the Verdin, Crissal Thrasher and the Gambel's Quail. Shirley writes: Here is a picture of the hooded oriole - male taken...
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Cordial Hummingbirds There’s a reason most hummingbird feeders are made with half a dozen or more individual feeding ports; more often than not, the common backyard-visiting hummingbird species are content to share a feeder with others as you have witnessed in photos on Wingscapes' Facebook page. Generally, that is. For example, this BirdCam 2.0 image of two Ruby-throated Hummingbirds recorded in Lineboro, Maryland, could not have...
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BirdCam Review from Memphis Commercial Appeal Horticulturist Felder Rushing had some nice things to say about the BirdCam in an article for the Memphis Commercial Appeal. He's been pointing his BirdCam to capture action at his homemade bird feeders, which he makes from recycled materials such as old kitchen colanders and trumpets. "The camera, which has been featured on Martha Stewart's program, can be set on...
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David Sibley's blog, Hope, and a Chesapeake Redstart!? Preeminent identification expert, artist, and renowned author David Sibley has a very cool blog that almost borders on academic. He's been at it for a few months now and has posted some great comments about how expectation can influence observation. This reminded me of studying Renes DesCartes in college...who was so skeptical of human perception, he questioned his own existence....
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Two Carolina's Dan Haas has posted some interesting shots at his blog - Nervous Birds - and commented..."If you are thinking about a gift for the birder, naturalist or photographer in your life, get the BIRDCAM...Get one. It's a hoot." Thanks Dan. Here is one of his shots of a Carolina Chickadee and a Carolina Wren...

Two Rubies and an Orange! Mary & Susan from Wild Birds Unlimited in Tallahassee got some awesome video over Thanksgiving. They captured footage of Baltimore Orioles, Ruby-crowned Kinglet, and a female (likely Ruby-throated) hummingbird...three "lifers" for the BirdCam.* Visit their site to see the video. *BirdCam Life List...oh boy. This is an absurdly ambitious project for someone who has struggled to maintain a blog. Basically, the idea...
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Zazu? Is That You? If you’ve seen the blockbuster animated movie The Lion King - and if the box office, DVD sales, and other related figures are correct, you very likely have - you undoubtedly remember Zazu, the officious and somewhat pompous bird who served as majordomo to King Mufasa. But what you might not know is that Zazu was modeled (physically, at least)...
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Snowbird If you’re a skier, you probably know Snowbird as one of North America’s great ski resorts. If you’re a fan of country-folk music, Snowbird is likely best know to you as one of Anne Murray’s most popular songs. But if you’re a bird watcher in the U.S. or Canada, the Dark-eyed Junco is your Snowbird. These short-winged little grey sparrows -...
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Welcome to All New Camera Owners! To all those who unwrapped a Wingscapes BirdCam 2.0, Audubon BirdCam, or TimelapseCam 8.0 this holiday season, welcome to the Wingscapes community! By now you’ve probably already unpacked and set-up your new camera. Of course, you might not yet have downloaded your first batch of images or videos yet, but for when you do, we wanted to make sure you...
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Drinking Birds Chances are you remember seeing the famous “drinking bird” toy at least once - the little plastic dumb-bell shaped figure, usually sporting a top hat, that repeatedly tips its bill into a glass only to immediately right itself then repeat the process over and over until everyone present tires of watching it. Strange as it may seem, these odd little...
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Auspicious First Bird Like all bird watchers, we eagerly await the sighting of the first bird of the new year. We know that in reality it is just a matter of chance but - like millions of other bird watchers the world over - we can’t help but feel that it is somehow indicative of how the year will play out for bird...
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Autofed Nuthatch One of the things we like best about social media is it allows us to see how people are using our products and what they think of them; most recently the new Wingscapes AutoFeeder. Now that it’s available in the marketplace, we’ve begun to see photos of them circulating around via Twitter and Facebook, as well as uploaded to the...
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How Birds Got Their Latin Names Back when old Carl von Linné - Linnaeus to his friends - came up with the idea of binomial nomenclature to help scientists sort out and describe each species they discovered, the idea was fairly simple: each creature was given a Latin genus name and a Latin species name. The genus name was shared by a number of similar species and...
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The Central Park Effect Originally established in 1857 and subsequently dramatically improved under the direction of the famous landscape designers Frederick Law Olmstead and Calvert Vaux (not the person for whom the well known species of swift was named; that was William Vaux) in 1873, New York City’s Central Park covers 843 acres of land and is the most visited urban park in the United States....
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Long Tailed Long Distance Relatives When viewing this video of Long-tailed Tits massing on a suet feeder at Hill View in England that Angela recorded using her original Wingscapes BirdCam, we were immediately struck by how familiar these little birds seemed to us - even though the species has never been recorded in the U.S. or Canada. Then it dawned on us: they look very much,...
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Malachite Sunbird - Sunbird from South Africa Because they are rather similar in appearance, many people assume that the hummingbirds of the New World and the sunbirds of Africa, Asia, and Australia are closely related. Looking at this lovely image of a Malachite Sunbird that Wingscapes Flickr Group member Jackie of Global Bird Trekkers recorded using her Wingscapes BirdCam as it visited a feeder in Britannia Bay,...
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Pre-dawn Hummingbird Even in the coldest, darkest months of a Pacific Northwest winter, Anna’s Hummingbirds can still be seen visiting feeders in Oregon and southwest Washington. They withstand the often sub-freezing temperatures by entering a deep “sleep” each night called torpor to conserve their much needed energy. Anna's Hummingbird Each morning they awaken long before dawn and begin feeding to ensure they take in...
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An Old Favorite Video of a Belted Kingfisher Of all the BirdCam videos we’ve ever recorded, this 2007 footage of a female Belted Kingfisher putting a lakeside fish feeder in Alabama to about as many different uses as a kingfisher can is certainly one of the most popular. Besides being a handy observation and fishing perch, the kingfisher gives us a superb demonstration of how to use such a...
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An Early Christmas Present Yields Immediate Results When Kathy noticed an unusual number of one of North America’s most colorful birds, the Painted Bunting, showing up at her feeders in Amelia Island, Florida, she got an idea - ask for a BirdCam as an early Christmas present. Fortunately, she got her wish and was immediately able to begin recording these beautiful images of her backyard visitors (the...
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Use “Relativity” to Judge the Size of Birds One of the trickiest skills to learn in bird watching is how to judge the size of a bird in the field - particularly when only one bird species is in view and no other species are nearby to which their relative size can be compared. Take this BirdCam 2.0 video of a small flock of Lazuli Buntings recorded by csrscience,...
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Get Ready for Hummingbirds With Spring now well underway, it’s time to be sure that all your backyard feeders are cleaned and stocked. While for most seed feeders this is a seasonal activity, for hummingbird feeders it should become a weekly one for the upcoming warmer months. Be sure to change the sugar solution (no red dye; just four parts water to one part ordinary...
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Ganster Common Grackle Although biologists continually advise us not to do it, it’s hard not to ascribe human feelings and characteristics to birds - particularly those we regularly see at our feeders. American Robins are “curious,” European Starlings are “trouble-makers,” and Black-capped (or Carolina, depending on your location) Chickadees are alternately “friendly” and “dapper.”   So it’s hard not to look at this BirdCam 2.0 picture of a Common...
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Cornell Lab Gets Funky For those who want a good photographic or video subject matter challenge, Cornell Lab of Ornithology is bringing back their Funky Nests in Funky Places contest for 2012. Have you noticed your local birds heading back and forth to a particular location while carrying grass, twigs, or other assorted potential nesting materials? Then you should waste no time in getting your Wingscapes...
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One Bird Species or Two Here’s a handy phrase likely to get you odd looks if said near non-birdwatchers: sexual dimorphism. Far from being something you’ll see a shocking exposé on an afternoon chat program, it’s simply a scientific term that states the male and female of a single species look different from one another.       Some species, such as American Robins, show little if any sexual...
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Dark Eyes and Pink Sides Another of the wonderful images Team Wingscapes has received from Connie in Loveland, Colorado is this one of a Dark-eyed junco, pink-sided form. Pink-sided Dark-eyed Juncos are generally found in the interior west and range as far east as the Great Plains during winter. While they can be confused for the somewhat darker headed Oregon form near the western edge of...
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BirdCam Backyard Discoveries Wingscapes BirdCam users quickly discover two things – there are more birds visiting their yards than they previously knew and the birds they did know were visiting do so more frequently than they thought. Take for example this image of a Common Yellowthroat male recently uploaded to the Wingscapes BirdCam Photo Gallery by Kathy from Amelia Island, Florida. Kathy writes...
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Wingscapes at the Verde Valley Birding Festival Wingscapes took the “show on the road” to Arizona last week and attended the Verde Valley Birding & Nature Festival at the Dead Horse Ranch State Park in Cottonwood, Arizona. The weather was hot and dry, the people were warm and friendly, and the birding was superb. While I escaped from the hottest parts of the days sheltered inside the...
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Surprise Discovery One of the great joys of having a Wingscapes BirdCam monitoring your feeders is the remarkable discoveries you can make about the variety of bird species that visit while you’re not watching. Take, for example, this covey of California Quail that was recorded browsing the seeds on the ground beneath one of the main sunflower seed-dispensing feeders we keep stocked...
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Junco Day in Scappoose, Oregon ...from our series "Catching up the Items to Blog Backlog"... In February, the Born Again Bird Watcher posted some great pictures he captured of Dark-eyed Juncos and much, much more. John Writes: It was a Junco-heavy day in Scappoose this second Saturday in February. The weather has suddenly turned from unexpectedly frigid with snow and ice to mild with sporadic rain (the normal...
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Mysteries of Flight Revealed One of the questions that is often asked of Team Wingscapes when we are demonstrating the Wingscapes BirdCam is “Can it capture still images of birds in flight?” Indeed it can. As this image of a Pine Warbler submitted to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery by BirdCam enthusiast extraordinaire David of Cary, NC demonstrates, the BirdCam has both the quick...
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The Juncos Have Landed As Dark-eyed Juncos are beginning to be seen in the Pacific Northwest, as they in many other parts of the country, I took the BirdCam down from the Mounting Arm on which it was positioned and placed it directly on the ground to capture some images of these ground feeding birds. Incidentally, if you, like me, have wondered at...
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Not the North Carolina State Bird While looking through the Wingscapes Photo Gallery today, we noticed that a number of new images had been added over the holidays. One from just this past December that particularly caught our attention was this picture of a Brown-headed Nuthatch and a Carolina Wren submitted by our good friend and Wingscapes BirdCam user David from North Carolina. An interesting bit of...
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Oh the Things You'll Learn! When I first began watching birds – well, perhaps consciously and intentionally watching birds, for who among the living has never stopped for an idle moment to watch a bird at some time during his or her life – two of the birds that most challenged my identification skills were the House Finch and the Purple Finch. Living in the...
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Picture Perfect Bluebird One of the greatest joys in any photographer’s life, professional or amateur, is when everything about a photograph – the subject, the background, the lighting, etc. – comes together perfectly. Take this superb image of a male Eastern Bluebird, for example, that was recently submitted to the Wingscapes BirdCam Photo Gallery by Cher from central New York state. The focus...
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Anna's Hummingbird Secret Revealed Back in the latter half of June, the regular Rufous Hummingbirds so commonly seen at our feeders in Scappoose, Oregon were joined by a somewhat larger male Anna’s Hummingbird. The Anna’s male is characterized by a gorget (the colorful and flashy feathers that cover the throat area of the males of many of the different hummingbird species seen in the...
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Up Front Flicker One of the benefits of the Wingscapes BirdCam is its portability. Get tired of recording images at one feeder? Simply move it to another – or reposition it to an entirely different portion of your yard. You’ll really be surprised at the difference a mere few yards of movement can make, especially if you shift it from a shrubby corner...
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Lawrence's Goldfinch Makes the Life List Once most bird watchers have both the American and Lesser Goldfinches included on their respective life lists, unless they frequently find themselves in southern California, they generally don’t expect to see the third U.S. inhabiting goldfinch, Lawrence’s Goldfinch, added for some time. So it has been with Team Wingscapes and the BirdCam Life List…  That is until this past...
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Sleek or Fluffy? Thanks to their ability to individually control each of their feathers to help regulate their body temperature, birds are remarkably changeable in their appearance. When cold, a perched bird can hunch down and “fluff up,” effectively creating an insulating down coat for itself. If the same bird is too warm, it can stretch out and sleek down its feathers to...
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A Finch from "Across the Pond" With Wingscapes BirdCams increasingly being put into use by people all around the globe, we are seeing an exciting expansion in the breadth of bird species images being uploaded to the Wingscapes BirdCam Photo Gallery. Just the other day, in fact, we noted this European Greenfinch that was added by Tony in Yeovil, Somerset, UK.  If this bird looks...
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The Variable Song Sparrow Song Sparrows are some of the most widely varied of all the North American feeder-visiting birds. Found in every one of the continental United States and most of the Canadian provinces, the Song Sparrow has been classified as having over thirty different subspecies. Those here in the Pacific Northwest are particularly reddish-brown in color while others commonly seen in the...
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Expressive Birds Let’s face it; some birds simply have more expressive faces than others. Oh, of course this is simply giving them human characteristics that are the accidental results of the markings on their feathers and the structure of their beaks. However even knowing this, it’s difficult to look at particular birds and not immediately assume that you understand what they’re thinking...
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More Great Birds from Marcus in Orlando Marcus from Orlando has sent us more great shots!  Thank you Marcus!

See Any Red There? Some birds are named for obvious physical markings – Black-headed Grosbeak, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, etc. However a few end up with names that make one think that the feature included in the name should be easily visible while it is in fact rarely seen. Case in point: the Red-bellied Woodpecker, shown here using a wonderful image submitted to the Wingscapes...
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Bird Yoga One of the amazing things about birds is the way that many of them can turn their heads almost 180 degrees and look directly over their own backs. What allows them this astonishing range of motion is the high number of vertebrae in their necks; the purpose for it is to allow them to preen and clean their feathers using...
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Chesapeake Redstart, part III... David Sibley has a recent post on his blog discussing the strange image of a Carolina Chickadee taken by the Bird Couple. He breaks it down simply, clearly, and no doubt correctly. Like his books, Sibley's blog is great to read. Check it out....

Special Guest Blogger: Science Fair Winner Austin Bouton With the Wingscapes BirdCam I reached a goal: I won my school’s science fair and I moved to the regional competition level. I used the BirdCam to record the feeding patterns at my backyard feeder and called this the “Seed n Feed” project. My data filled up over three pages of Microsoft Excel spreadsheets! I also discovered I have a...
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Winter Birds from Cindy in Indy! Cindy from Indianapolis wrote in with these great shots. Cindy writes: Still loving the BirdCam.  Can't wait for all the springtime birds to return for their portraits

From our Friends at Wild Bird Centers... Mary Swanson from the Wild Bird Center in Birmingham, Alabama submits these great photos taken by Dave Boyd from the Wild Bird Center in Dunwoody, Georgia.  Mary Writes: "This Cam is set up in back of his store!!  Pictures 3 & 4 are just great bluebird shots on our WBC private label feeder! Thought you might enjoy these." A Bluebird next...
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New Jersey Red-belly David Saidnawey of Red Bank, NJ's Wild Birds Unlimited sent in this image of a Red-bellied Woodpecker pouncing on some suet. Some think this is the classic bird name misnomer. Maybe. I like the name because it requires a little memory to learn it. When we first started playing with prototypes of the BirdCam, I would test my wife's ID...
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Photos Submitted from Indianapolis We received this great photo from Cindy in Indianapolis of a Red-bellied Woodpecker and a European Starling. Cindy Writes: Sharing a fun photo taken with my bird cam...My name is Cindy and it was taken in Indianapolis, IndianaPS - LOVE the camera!!! Great shot Cindy. Thank you.

"Kissing" Cardinals When it comes to birds that best symbolize Valentine’s Day, it’s hard to do better than the Northern Cardinal. Not only is the color of the male the vibrant red color associated with the holiday, but the behavior of male and female cardinals in courtship can’t help but bring to mind thoughts of romance. Take these two cardinals uploaded to...
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BREAKING NEWS! Birdchick BirdCamming in Panama Team Wingscapes has recently learned that the famous Birdchick is presently at Canopy Tower in Panama with a Wingscapes BirdCam. She’s set up the BirdCam at one of the resort’s feeding stations and, true to her highly social media style, is actively blogging, Facebook sharing, and Tweeting pictures of the birds - such as this oropendula - recorded there by...
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Opening Day at ABA 2008 Monday saw the first day of exhibits at the American Birding Association's national convention. Birding enthusiasts from all around North America and sometimes far beyond are flocking to Snowbird, Utah to get a look at the latest and greatest bird watching gear, books, and birding travel opportunities. Naturally, Wingscapes is among those companies exhibiting essential tools, such as the BirdCam,...
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Team Wingscapes Has Landed Well, here we are at the 12th Annual Space Coast Birding & Wildlife Festival. The weather is cool but the skies are clear and bright. Most importantly, of course, the birds are abundant. The field trips are already returning with extensive lists of the species seen. At the festival center, located in the Gymnatorium at Brevard Community College-North Campus, the exhibitor...
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Team Wingscapes' at the Space Coast 2009 Festival Despite our intention to post directly from the Space Coast Birding & Nature Festival being thwarted by a bit of Internet connection trouble, the overall experience of Team Wingscapes at the festival itself was terrific. The visitors stopping by the Wingscapes booth to check out the BirdCam were very enthusiastic and eager to acquire a BirdCam of their own to...
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Midwest Birding Symposium 2009 a Huge Success As a proud sponsor of the 2009 Midwest Birding Symposium, members of the Wingscapes team recently attended the event to participate in its activities, lectures, and birding community fellowship, as well as to share with the attendees the news of the exciting new additions to the Wingscapes product line. The symposium, held this year in Lakeside, Ohio, was by far...
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Juvenile Red-headed Woodpecker June – the month when the young adults of not only humans but a variety of species leave both their proverbial as well as real nests and set out for life in the world. Keep your eyes open in your backyard and on walks around your neighborhood, and you’re likely to see the juveniles from a number of different bird...
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"Stock the Buffet" for Great Photos One of the most effective techniques used by professional bird and wildlife photographers to ensure as many opportunities for capturing as many images as possible is to set out a “little treat” to entice the intended subjects to visit the place in which it would be best to photograph them. Wingscapes BirdCam user Harold from Jackson, Tennessee wonderfully demonstrates...
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Surprise Woodpecker It happens to all birdwatchers. Regardless of how detailed your notes are or how many photos you take, there will at some point be that one bird you didn't particularly notice at first but about which you later found yourself thinking when the cartoon light bulb suddenly appears over your head and you say "Hey! that was a..." Such was...
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Annual Winter Return of Bald Eagles to Ridgway ...from our series "Catching up the Items to Blog Backlog"... In January, Jason Beason, special monitoring projects coordinator for the Rocky Mountain Bird Observatory, presented "Bald Eagles & Other Raptors" at the Ridgway Community Center.Below is an excerpt from the article we found describing his efforts: "Beason received a B.S. degree in 1990 from the Ohio State University where he majored in...
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Swapping Grosbeaks in Oregon With the change in weather from the rains of early spring to a sudden spell of unexpected sun and unseasonably warm weather, the Evening Grosbeaks suddenly left northwest Oregon on their continued migration north. Their loud “cheerups” are no longer being heard from the high branches of the evergreens. Fortunately, the northwest is not entirely grosbeak free. The Black-headed...
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What It's All About It’s hard to imagine a better illustration of the Wingscapes motto “See what you’ve been missing” than this image of a Northern Cardinal attending a well-hidden nest full of young birds. Mark from Harrisonville, Missouri was both fortunate and attentive enough to notice the location of this Northern Cardinal nest, and strategically positioned his Wingscapes BirdCam to record the normally...
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A BirdCam View of South Africa When we first saw this photo in the Wingscapes BirdCam flickr® group, we thought “Those are some really unusual-looking sparrows.” However when we took a closer look (and read the photo’s caption) we quickly understood that they were Cape Sparrows (and a Cape Weaver) from South Africa!   Jackie from South Africa, the contributor of this as well as a host of...
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House-hunting Flickers Regardless of what the U.S. real estate market might be doing at the moment for people, homes for the nation’s birds are in prime demand right now. Millions upon millions have recently moved into or built new residences and begun families, or are still actively “in the market” for the place they will call home this season. Take these Northern...
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Almost Frozen Rufous Hummingbird Capturing an image of a hummingbird in flight where the wings are frozen in the moment is not easy. With a wing beat speed of around 60 per second, even a professional-level DSLR camera often can’t do it.  Which is why we were all very impressed by this BirdCam image of a male Rufous Hummingbird uploaded to the BirdCam...
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White-throated Sparrow from the BirdCam Flickr Group There has been quite a bit of activity over at the Wingscapes BirdCam Flickr Group lately. Some great images have been added by enthusiastic BirdCam users from around the world. One that particularly caught our eye was this White-throated Sparrow contributed by "Zunzuncito" in Dearborn, Michigan. When it comes to sparrows in North America, it's difficult to think of a more...
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Florida Scrub-jay Added to the BirdCam Life List Of the many species of jay found in North America, the one that most attracts the attention of bird watchers and ornithologists alike is the Florida Scrub-jay, Aphelocoma coerulescens. Found only among the oak scrublands of Florida, Florida Scrub-jays are known for their intelligence and their habit of remaining together in multi-generational family groups. Naturally, when Carol from...
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The BirdCam and the First Dark-eyed Junco of 2008 ...from our series "Catching up the Items to Blog Backlog"... John, at  A DC Birding Blog writes about the top 10 Nature Moments of 2007.  He mentions the BirdCam capturing some of the first birds he has seen in 2008. "...Meanwhile, I have already seen my first birds of 2008. The very first was a dark-eyed junco. (These photos were taken...
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The Towhees are Back Even though the weather is still more or less sunny and warm in the Pacific Northwest, you can tell autumn is approaching by the fact that the Spotted Towhees are back. (Some are actually here year round but they all but disappear during in the summer months.) A member of the same family as many familiar sparrows and juncos, these...
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More from the Flycatcher The Flycatcher sent along a few other images as well. Based on images sent into us here at Wingscapes, Floyd is HANDS DOWN the our favorite BirdCam photographer out there at the moment. Beautiful shots. Thanks. Townsend's Warbler... Bewick's Wren... Dark-eyed Junco... Red-breasted Nuthatch...

Young European Starling and Northern Flicker Photos from Oregon Deb from Gresham, Oregon sent in these great shots of young European Starlings begging to be fed by a a parent as well as a Northern Flicker feeding on an upper suet block in order to use the lower part of the feeder as a tail prop. Thanks Deb!

Cassin's Finches in Snowbird, Utah One of the points to always remember when watching birds in a montane area such as Snowbird, Utah, is that although the birds to be found there are quite interesting, beautiful, and not always easily seen at lower elevations, there are also fewer species in general to be observed. One of the species that is regularly seen is the Cassin’s...
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Watch This Space Any day now, I will check the images from the BirdCam I have aimed at this exact space on our property and there will be seen in at least one of them the most beautiful of winter’s familiar birds – the Varied Thrush. Each December they come down into the lowlands when the snows blanket the ground at the...
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Laura's First BirdCam Photos We came across this post and wanted to share it with you. Laura, from "Laura Goes Birding" has captured her first photos using the Wingscapes BirdCam.  Here is a Western Scrub-jay leaning in very close to the camera - just one of the birds whose images she captured.  We look forward to more great pictures from Laura.

Male American Kestrel! Not only was Connie from Loveland, Colorado’s recent submission to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery of this superb image of a male American Kestrel a new life bird for the Wingscapes BirdCam Life List, it was the first addition of both a new taxonomic genus (Falco) and family (Falconidae) to that list. Connie reports that this is the male of a...
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Cactus Wren Makes the Life List! Birdwatchers well know that as one’s life list gets longer, the time between additions to it lengthens as well. So we were delighted when Milton from Surprise, Arizona uploaded this image of a Cactus Wren that he recorded with his BirdCam to the photo gallery. It makes a superb addition to our Wingscapes BirdCam Life List. Milton reports that the image...
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Crows are Cool... The Bird Man sent me this amazing video of a crow that befriended a kitten. Evidence that the internet is an endless source of miscellanea and that crows are cool.

Picture Perfect Squirrel While there’s little disagreement that squirrels cane be a bane to practitioners of backyard bird feeding, it is sometimes (I said “sometimes”) quite difficult to put aside how charming they can be. As the snow was falling steadily all day here in northwest Oregon, I took to throwing handfuls of seed on the ground for the thrushes, juncos, doves, and yes,...
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Great photos from Georgetown, Delaware Chuck from Georgetown, Delaware sent in some great shots!  We hope he sends in some of the Pileated Woodpecker he talks about below.  We would love to add that to our BirdCam Life List.  Thanks Chuck! Chuck writes: Having lots of fun with the BirdCam.  I am trying to lure my evasive Pileated to my suet feeder(s).  He likes to stay up...
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Chinese Devil Squirrel Today's squirrel-proof feeders would not stand a chance...

Possible Junco and Sparrow Hybrid? One of the benefits of having a Wingscapes BirdCam is that every so often it records a bird that is a bit of a mystery. Not just a bird that isn’t readily identifiable but that is not quite like anything found in the field guides either. Take, for example, this Dark-eyed Junco image I downloaded from the BirdCam in...
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Gambel's Quail Shows Its Southwestern Colors Of all the birds common to North America, few are more recognizable or charismatic than those of the quail family, particularly those of the California and Gambel's Quail species. While both appear quite similar, the males each having the classic forward-curving head-plume that bobs as they scurry along the ground, the Gambel’s Quail prefers the desert southwest to the Pacific...
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Camera Hog The Born Again Bird Watcher nabbed these photos of a Douglas Squirrel with his BirdCam while it was set directly on the ground to catch the activity of ground feeding birds. Apparently, he is a bit of a "Camera Hog" (the squirrel, not the Born Again Bird Watcher).

Western Scrub-Jay Floyd Schrock of McMinnville, Oregon writes Flycatcher - a great birding blog. He sent a nice note saying, "The BirdCam has opened up a whole new way for me to pursue both my 'birdwatching' and my photography of birds.  Through this little robot I can find out what is going on in my backyard while I'm away, and also get...
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Ospreys Live Of all the birds North American birds that have had a “near miss” as the result of human activity, the Osprey is probably the one that was pushed closest to the brink of extinction. Fortunately, thank to the efforts of Rachel Carson, Roger, Tory Peterson, and numberless others, both professional and volunteer, it was saved and is now doing very...
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Stevie Nicks' White-winged Dove We’re not sure if Stevie Nicks, the award-winning songwriter and flamboyant chanteuse of Fleetwood Mac fame is a bird watcher, but whether she is or not she certainly got the call of the White-winged Dove right in her famous song “Edge of Seventeen.” Often thought to be called “White-winged Dove” by her many fans due to it’s famous chorus “Just like...
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Northern Flicker Front and Center We’ve really got to tip our proverbial hats to frequent BirdCam Photo Gallery contributor nancybirdies of Vienna, Virginia - she really has a talent for setting up her Audubon BirdCam to record just the right image. Take this yellow-shafted Northern Flicker pair, for example. Either one would have made a great photo all by itself, but recording both in the same image, and positioned such...
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Crouching Starling, Hidden Dragon One of the less accepted theories as to why European Starlings succeeded so quickly in establishing themselves as a dominant bird species in North America following their introduction to the continent by members of the American Acclimatization Society back in the 1890s is that, unlike the other birds in the area, they knew kung fu. Crouching Starling Just kidding of course, but...
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Turkeys Gone Wild! You know how turkeys are when they get together at a favorite watering hole - they just can’t seem to control themselves. All mugging for the camera and crowding around the bar; in this video one even gets up and dances on it. We’d better stop before we rile the ghost of Benjamin Franklin. A keen observer of Wild Turkeys -...
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Mourning Doves Know the Art of Not Being Seen Judging just how effective a particular bird’s feather colors and patterns are at camouflaging it isn’t always easy unless you see it against the type of habitat in which it is most commonly found. Take this Mourning Dove, for example. When seen sitting on a wire or a nicely manicured lawn, they don’t appear to be a well camouflaged species. Mourning Dove But...
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Hope Remains - But Does the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker? Both the American Ornithologists’ Union and BirdLife International still include it on their respective lists of species. Scientists still hotly debate its existence. Novelists are even using the possibility of its continued survival as the theme of their books. Such is the mystique of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker. It’s not difficult to understand why the idea of its existence is so compelling....
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Whatever Floats Your Blue Jay Perhaps in the case of this Blue Jay taking a dip in Jacqueline from Takoma Park, Maryland’s nautically-shaped bird bath, we should change the old saying to “whatever floats you in a boat.” Jacqueline used her Audubon BirdCam to capture this delightful image of the jay in mid-bath. We liked it so much we made it a Wingscapes Staff Favorite. Blue...
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Breakfast Table Jay Hearing on the news that the weather in England has been on the exceptionally cold side recently brought to mind our friends at the The Horticultural Channel, so we popped over to their YouTube channel to see what winter-time garden birds they’ve been recording at their bird table with the Wingscapes Audubon BirdCam. While they’ve put up quite a bit of...
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White Squirrel! When we saw this Aububon BirdCam image of a pure white squirrel uploaded to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery by Carol in Hendersonville, North Carolina, we thought it was Christmas all over again! After all, how may times do you see such a great photo of such an unusual animal. White Squirrel While the pure white fur on this squirrel would be commonly...
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Dipped In Raspberry Juice Roger Tory Peterson famously described the appearance of a male Purple Finch as looking very much “like a sparrow dipped in raspberry juice.” Seeing this BirdCam 2.0 image of one recorded in New Brunswick, Canada by frerdann, it’s not difficult to understand why Peterson used this particular example. Purple Finch Interestingly, the red color in feathers of the males of these birds,...
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Road Trip Fun Cam While many of the images and videos we share on the Wingscapes blog are often used in a serious way to explain a particular behavior in the bird, mammal, or plant that was recorded, we don’t want anyone to get the idea that they also can’t be used for something that’s just plain fun. That’s why back in June of 2010...
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A Curiously Named Woodpecker Naming birds after an obvious quality they possess is both common and generally sensible. Black-capped Chickadees have black “caps.” Common Yellowthroats have bright yellow throats. However once in a while such names seem to make no sense at all. Red-bellied Woodpecker Take the Red-bellied Woodpecker for example. While it does indeed have a red belly, as shown in this image that George...
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MangaCam - Time Lapse Video of Illustration Work We never get tired of seeing all the things people do with Wingscapes cameras. In addition to capturing motion-triggered images and videos of backyard birds and other wildlife, timelapse recordings of both indoor and outdoor plant growth, and documenting renovations and construction projects, we’ve more recently been seeing a good number of artists employing Wingscapes cameras to record their work. For...
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Of Bluebirds and Birdcams One of the questions we're often asked is if the Wingscapes BirdCam 2.0 or Audubon BirdCam units are in any way distracting to the birds and other wildlife they're used to record. Well, Janet, a contributing member of the Wingscapes Facebook page recently shared with us a photo that answers the question succinctly. This little bluebird doesn't seem bothered by...
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California's Brown Pelicans: A Conservation Success Story For more than a month now, Brown Pelicans that are sick or dead have been found on California beaches, particularly in the Monterey Bay area. Many have been brought to various wildlife care centers in an effort to nurse them back to health as well as to try an discover just what is causing them to be found in such poor...
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Why Do Hummingbirds Hum? Of all the classic kid jokes, “Why do hummingbirds hum?” is by far one of our favorites. The answer, of course, is “Because they don’t know the words.” Granted, the real cause of their trademark sound - the sound that makes most us stop and look around for an airborne glint of green, red, purple, or blue - is their rapid...
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Chickadees and Titmice It doesn’t take a very long look at this BirdCam 2.0 video of a Tufted Titmouse cracking a seed, as recorded by TreeBreeze, to see that titmice and chickadees share a primary feeding technique. And after all - why shouldn’t they? They’re close relatives in the great family of birds. In fact, it’s only out of a sense of overpowering but...
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Think Cool Weather All across the U.S. and a good portion of Canada, this summer’s temperatures have been - and continue to be - unusually high. Therefore in an effort to do our part to help people everyone cool during these sweltering days of late summer, we present a short Wingscapes BirdCam video of three suet feeder visiting woodpeckers recorded by Amy during the snowiest...
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Better Hedgehog Homes and Gardens Without a doubt, birds hold pride of place when it comes to the amount of energy, effort, and improvements many of us put into our back yards and gardens; however in England there is a small waddling mammal that comes in a very close second - the hedgehog. So welcome are they in back gardens that not only are hedgehogs commonly...
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Adaptability It’s not clear just what caused this Eurasian Jay’s left foot to be malformed. Perhaps it was an injury that didn’t heal well. Perhaps it was an infection. Perhaps it was this way since hatching. Whatever the cause, it could be a very serious problem for it indeed if it is unable to adapt. Had the problem involved its beak or...
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Thumbs Up One of the things about humans that have made us so successful in adapting to our surroundings is an often over-looked bit or our anatomy: our opposable thumbs. We’re not alone in having these remarkably useful digits that can be rotated to face the fingers of the same hand in order to allow things to be firmly grasped; primates have...
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An Old Friend Has a New Name We’ve long enjoyed seeing how Sean at The Horticultural Channel has put his Wingscapes Audubon BirdCam into use around his garden allotment. However when we recently checked in with him to see what he’s been doing recently we discovered that his YouTube channel where a wide range of interesting gardening and bird feeding advice and instructional videos (such as this...
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A Mutually Beneficial Relationship Remember all those nature documentaries about Africa where half a dozen small birds are seen perching on the back of a rhino? Well they’re not just there for the view; they help keep the animals on which they perch free of annoying fleas and ticks and in return get an easy meal of the creatures they pick off the rhino’s...
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Something You Don’t See Every Day Here’s something you won’t see every day, or any “day” for that matter, because Ringtails such as this one are only active at night. Small carnivorous mammals that look like a combination of a fox, a cat, and a raccoon, Ringtails sleep most of the day and venture out after dark in search of a wide range of prey from small...
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City Birder Finds BirdCam Success Since beginning this project two years ago, I've been reading birding blogs. I have a particular interest in urban bird blogs. One of the most compelling aspects of birding is that it provides a way for people to connect with wildlife and nature regardless of where they live. Anyone, anywhere can enjoy birds...less true with other types of wildlife. That...
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BirdCam Week at The Zen Birdfeeder I'm working through a backlog of items I want to post about. In early December, our friend Nancy Castillo posted some great BirdCam images on her blog The Zen Birdfeeder.  Nancy runs a Wild Birds Unlimited store and was one of our first dealers to catch-on to a great benefit of the BirdCam...it can be used to showcase other products....
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Let's Go to the Video! John from Scappoose, Oregon tries out the BirdCam's video feature and discusses on his blog...Born Again Bird Watcher

Greater Ani Photo from Panama One of the great things about the Wingscapes BirdCam being used by ornithologists in their field research projects is that they send us images of some amazing birds. Christine Riehl, a researcher from Princeton University who uses BirdCams in her field studies, sent this amazing photo from one of her BirdCams in Panama of a Greater Ani leaving its nest. ...
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Heeeyyyy… Chachalaca! While Wingscapes was attending the Rio Grande Valley Birding Festival in Harlingen, Texas, we slipped away over to Weslaco and paid a visit to the Valley Nature Center. A splendid urban wildlife refuge, Valley Nature offers easily accessible trails through some of the valley’s best birding and butterfly watching habitat. Naturally, we brought along a BirdCam and set it up...
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Martha Stewart Loves Her BirdCam! Martha Stewart continues to enjoy her Wingscapes BirdCam and share her photos with fans. In her post this week on The Martha Blog, she gives an update on her BirdCam and posts some photos from home. The Martha featured the BirdCam on her television show this past February.

The Ring-necked Duck of Happiness Patti from Sheffield Village, Ohio was thrilled to discover that her Wingscapes BirdCam had recorded this image of a female Ring-necked Duck that was being seen on the lake near her home. We are thrilled that she uploaded it to the Photo Gallery as it becomes our latest addition to the Wingscapes BirdCam Life List.  As many bird watchers...
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Snakes and Turtles and Mice...Oh My! Pam from Florida sent us these wild non-bird photos taken in her yard. Thanks Pam! Pam writes:"Attached is a photo taken in our backyard here in Florida that was quite the surprise. A red corn snake happened to be passing by when the picture was taken. The bird in the background is a ground dove. FYI: the brown head of the...
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Noisy Miner Video from Tasmania As they say in the sports world, "Let's go to the video!"The video we'll go to today is one of a Noisy Miner recorded and submitted to the Wingscapes BirdCam Video Gallery by Elli in Tasmania, Australia. Elli writes that visits of this bird to her bird bath are a daily afternoon occurrence. For those who might...
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BirdCam Versatility Mike from Milton, Delaware, sent in these BirdCam pictures of birds that do not normally frequent a typical backyard bird feeder. They are great examples of the versatility of the BirdCam. Great shots, Mike! Thanks.

It's All In How You Approach the Problem In life, some challenges are a little more daunting in others. While some obstacles are easily overcome with the resources at hand, the solutions to others are more elusive and require far more creativity for the problem to be solved.   Take the one faced by this Baltimore Oriole in an image uploaded to the BirdCam Photo Gallery by Jeanne of...
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Greater Roadrunner from Arizona Shirley and Wayne from Cottonwood, Arizona purchased a BirdCam the beginning of May.  On the second day of shooting, they sent us these great shots.  So far, they hold the record for the most BirdCam Life List pictures submitted. We look forward to receiving more from Shirley and Wayne! Shirley writes: (5/5/08) We just got our camera set up to take pictures today...
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Female Northern Cardinal Mike from Milton, Delaware sent in this picture of a Female Northern Cardinal. He writes... Dear Wingscapes: This is from our first batch of pictures, taken February 18, 2008. We had a wonderful time viewing the first of what promises to be a source of great, future bird-delights!Thanks Mike.

First BirdCam Parakeet! Since the introduction of the two new BirdCam models, the Wingscapes BirdCam Life List has been growing by leaps and bounds. The latest addition is this remarkable photo of a Monk Parakeet uploaded to the BirdCam Photo Gallery by Rick in Tamarac, Florida. Although not native to the United States, these colorful and raucous birds have become well established in...
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Dangerous Beauty If it weren’t for the fact that, as an introduced invasive species, the European Starling is such a threat to many native North American birds, we may very well consider them beautiful. Glossy black highlighted with iridescent blues, purples, and greens in summer, and speckled with a white “star field” pattern against a black background in winter, these birds are...
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BirdCam Survives Raccoon Attack?!? The Bird Couple wrote in to tell us about their BirdCam adventures: Lisa Writes: ...I enjoyed the pics of the Cedar Waxwings We had an episode with the BirdCam and a raccoon on our deck.  No pictures, but your machine really took a beating and lived to tell the tale.  The story is on our blog. Lisa

fox eating a midnight snack Of all the features of the BirdCam 2.0, the flash has certainly done the most to enable BirdCam users to discover and record images of the many interesting creatures that prowl the night right outside their very doors. From skunks to raccoons to deer and even bears, BirdCam users have been uploading images they’ve recorded of their local nocturnal wildlife to the...
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Red Tailed Hawk via PlantCam Almost immediately after it was first introduced, users of the original Wingscapes BirdCam began demonstrating that just because it was named the BirdCam didn’t mean it was only capable of capturing images and videos of birds. Not surprisingly, with the release of the latest Wingscapes camera models, that creative trend continues as strongly as ever.   Case in point: this superb image...
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1 in 5 Americans are Birdwatchers According to USFWS I know a lot of birdwatchers, but I was still surprised to learn that 20% of Americans participate in birdwatching! According to a report by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, there are about 48 million birders in the U.S.. 88% are backyard birders, and the average birdwatcher is 50 years old with an above-average income and education level....
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Lion Guardians in Africa Put the BirdCam to Use Living with Lions is a research and conservation group in Kenya, and Lion Guardians is a program designed to reduce pressure on lions by employing local Maasai warriors to protect the lions from illegal killing.  In April of this year, the Lion Guardians received a Wingscapes BirdCam as a gift from Sheri and Owen Hogle from the Wild Bird...
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Tips for a New Birder? I just set my BirdCam up this week and am really enjoying it so far (I work in marketing for Wingscapes but just got my hands on my own!). When I was a kid I would sit for hours in the woods with my grandfather recording bird calls, but that was decades ago and now I'm trying to get back...
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BirdCam Tips and Tricks: Ground Level Positioning When you have a Wingscapes BirdCam, one of the things you find yourself doing after awhile is thinking of new ways to position it for capturing images of birds and other visiting wildlife from different perspectives. For example, placing the BirdCam directly on the ground provides the perfect position to get the eye-level view of ground feeding birds and other...
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An Original Robin Opinions differ about just how the bird commonly known as the American Robin got its name. One popular story follows the idea that when early settlers from Europe arrived on the eastern shores of what would someday become the United States and Canada, they thought the orange-breasted thrushes they saw there looked similar to the Robins they knew so well...
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Not Your Everyday Pigeons For those who spend all their time in cities, the idea of getting excited over seeing a pigeon likely seems absurd. After all, pigeons are pigeons – if you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all. Right? Well… not quite. While the non-native pigeon commonly seen in cities throughout the U.S. and Canada (officially named the Rock Dove) is not a...
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100 Acres BirdCam Video on Flickr 100 Acres Bird Cam, originally uploaded by IMA - Indianapolis Museum of Art.Wow! This is one of the coolest videos we've ever seen using images created by the Wingscapes BirdCam. Awesome! Thanks for sharing this.

Ukrainian Flamingos? Two words that don’t often come to mind as a matching pair are “Ukraine” and “flamingo;” however those are just the two words that were coupled in a recent upload to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery by Wingscapes BirdCam user Eleonora. Unfortunately, little information beyond that they were flamingos living in an enclosure in a Sevastopol, Ukraine park was shared as part...
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Oh! A Deer - a Black-tailed Deer Set up a Wingscapes BirdCam in your backyard and sooner or later (most likely sooner) you'll capture a few images of creatures other than birds. A visiting squirrel might be the first added to your mammal collection, or perhaps a raccoon. However if you're lucky, you might record something a little larger. This passing Black-tailed Deer fawn (a subspecies of...
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Frosty Fox Since the release of the new Wingscapes BirdCam 2.0 with built-in flash for night-time and low light photos, we have been seeing many more mammal photos, such as this one of a frost-covered Red Fox recorded by Dan in Westhampton, Massachusetts, uploaded to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery. Unlike birds, mammals tend to be nocturnal in their activities. Because of this...
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Bicoastal Podcast about the BirdCam Greetings...Bicoastal media just posted an interview I did with them. Check it out... Listen to Part 1 Listen to Part 2

Chesapeake Redstart, part II... So here is the vague image that the Birdcouple took with the BirdCam. A larger version of the image is available on their site (click the image below to get there, then click this same image on their site to enlarge). When asked for his thoughts, David Sibley responded..."I'm certain the bird in the photo is a Carolina Chickadee with...
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apologies....and BirdWatchRadio! I do not know what it is about the holidays and Bird Watch America, but they always seem to precede a serious lull in blogging. This happened last year. However, I am shortening my winter blogging lulls with each passing year. We are back, and have a folder filled with interesting things to blog about. We are getting great images...
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Are you kidding? Parahawking....birdcamming times 4,000,000 This is the wildest thing I've seen in a while. Whoa. As if paragliding or falconry aren't intense enough without combining them? http://www.parahawking.com/index.php Oh yeah, they also ATTACH CAMERAS TO THE BIRDS!!! And I thought that I had a problem trying to do too many things at once. Whew!

Yellow-headed Blackbird Spotted in Orlando!? ...More from Marcus in Orlando Marcus in Orlando let us know about this unusual siting of a Yellow-headed Blackbird in Orlando, Florida by Andrew Boyle.  The below picture was not taken with the BirdCam. Andrew writes: Hello All After picking up the van from the dealer and getting some confirmation sightings from yesterday, I headed back to look for the Yellow-headed Blackbird which...
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Best BirdCam Photos of 2009 - Most Unusual Species or Behavior Next in our review of the best BirdCam photos of 2009, we present the Most Unusual Species or Behavior category. First up, a bird that most bird watchers would give their eye teeth to open the blinds and see in their yard - the California Condor (photo uploaded by James from Kern County, California): Next, Stephen from Rockland, Maine contributed this...
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Young Crows Can Be Real Juvenile Delinquents There’s just something about crows and ravens that makes them always appear to be up to no good. Even the words used to describe groups of them (a “murder” of crows, a “conspiracy” of ravens) gives them an air of menace. Young Crows Apparently they begin cultivating this scurillous image early. Audubon BirdCam photographer and frequent contributor nancybirdies notes how this group...
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Thats One BIG Hummingbird! As they say in world of televised professional sports - “let’s go to the video.” Yes, we admit it; we spend quite a lot of time here on the Wingscapes blog discussing the great photos uploaded to the Photo Gallery by enthusiastic BirdCam users. As a result, we sometimes don’t spend enough time looking at the results of one of the...
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Chipmunk Trapped in Birdfeeder: Call My Lawyer! I Was Framed! “I didn’t do it!” “I wasn’t even there!” Yeah, yeah, we know; we’ve heard it all before. It wasn’t you; it was the Squirrel Brothers or the Grackle Gang. Oh we’ve suspected that you've been up to something for a long time, but whenever we got close to proving it, you’ve always played cute with us to throw us off your...
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Why These Woodpeckers are Called “Yellow-shafted” When first confronted with one of North America’s largest woodpeckers, the Northern Flicker, many new bird watchers are surprised to learn that they appear dramatically different depending on where they’re seen. Those in the western part of the U.S. have red shafts to their feathers while the feathers of those in the east have yellow shafts. The problem is that...
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Mark Your Calendars for a Funny New Movie About Birding! It’s not often that bird watchers have the benefit of knowing exactly when an exceptional bird they’ve been hoping to see will be observable in their area, however in the case of three particularly “exceptional birds” - Steve Martin, Jack Black, and Owen Wilson - the date will be October 14th when their new movie The Big Year opens in...
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Some Guys, like the Scarlet Tanager, Will Do Anything For Attention When it comes to feather color, most bird species like to blend in with their habitats to prevent their becoming lunch for a passing predator. Sparrows, for example, are usually shades of brown and gray making them hard to see as they forage through fields. Most female ducks perfectly match the reeds among which they swim. And just try to...
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The House Sparrow Had A Mistaken Introduction Despite the fact that they are now one of the most commonly seen of all bird species in the U.S. and Canada, the House Sparrow (like this one photographed by nancybirdies in Vienna, Virginia using her Audubon BirdCam) is not a native North American species. House Sparrow Originally introduced from England into Brooklyn, New York in 1851 and a few years...
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A Shy and Retiring Jay Unlike the raucous and highly visible Blue Jays, Western Scrub-Jays, and Steller’s Jays commonly seen throughout the U.S. and Canada, the large and colorful Eurasian Jays found all across Europe are shy birds that generally tend to stay well hidden in their preferred woodlands. Birdcam footage from RSPB online shop on Vimeo. Which is why this BirdCam 2.0 video of a Eurasian...
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The Real Secret of Woodpeckers The secret to woodpeckers is not so much that they have strong bills (which they certainly do) but that they have strong tails. Their strong, stiff tail feathers are used as a prop to keep them upright when clinging to a vertical surface, and even more importantly to give them leverage when either excavating holes or drumming with their bills. Woodpecker This...
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Hair Raising Inexperience OK, try this. Concentrate really hard and make every hair on your head stand straight up at the same time. Did it work? No? Well, don’t feel bad. We couldn’t do it either. Truth be told, no humans can. Not even most mammals have the localized muscle control to move any of the hairs on their bodies. Birds, on the other hand,...
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Nuthatches: The Original Hackers Despite how the word is most commonly used these days, hacking is not just about secretly accessing computer networks and fiddling around with them. Long before anyone even thought of computers - or electricity for that matter - most people who paid any attention whatsoever to birds knew all about hacking - nut hacking that is. While their name changed to...
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Female Painting Bunting is Just Plain Beautiful How many times have we all seen the same manner of description? "Male strikingly colored, vivid (red, blue, yellow) head with bold contrasting stripes along the (breast, wings, tail); female mostly plain." It just doesn't seem fair. After all, the reason for most female birds having feathers that don’t attract attention is to help protect them from predators while on...
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Desert Wildlife from Arizona Desert Wildlife from Arizona Our friends Shirley and Wayne from Cottonwood, Arizona have sent us two more BirdCam photos, a Common Raven and a Collared Peccary (commonly called a Javelina) to add to our Avian and Non-Avian BirdCam Life Lists. They have truly set the bar for the number of BirdCam Life List pictures we have received from our very excited...
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Happy Labor Day! Check Out These Nesting Bluebirds While birds “neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns,” they most certainly do labor – particularly in the construction of nests. This being Labor Day in the United States we thought it therefore appropriate to stop for a moment and consider just what a monumental effort this actually is for them.   Nesting Bluebirds Using only their beaks either to chisel out...
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Backyard Monks - Monk Parakeets in the Backyard While we're not certain if Rick from Tamarac, Florida has ever had an Orange Bishop on his landing, thanks to the marvelous series of images he took with his Audubon BirdCam and uploaded to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery we do know that his mother has little green monks in her backyard - Monk Parakeets that is. Pair of Monk Parakeets Not native...
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Audubon's Red-winged Starling When John James Audubon first sketched the Red-winged Blackbird, he called it not by the name we know it today but by another - the Red-winged Starling. To those accustomed to seeing the male in its jet black plumage adorned with bold red shoulder patches, this association with starlings might seem a little odd. Red-winged Blackbird, aka Red-winged Starling However when this...
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What Color Goes With Orange? Male Baltimore Oriole Wants to Know In order to help protect them from predators, the plumage of many birds closely matches the colors and often even the patterns of their habitats. Plovers are generally a dusty tan color to match the ground on which they nest, female ducks are commonly streaked with brown and black to help them hide in the reed beds of ponds. But...
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The Auspicious Mourning Dove From as far back as human history is recorded, the dove has not only been understood as a sign of love and purity but of good fortune as well. Consider the over two-thousand-year-old verses of the Song of Solomon associating the return of the turtledove as a sign of more pleasant times to come: For, lo, the winter is past, the...
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The Brown Thrasher It often comes as a surprise to many people when they learn that, according to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, the Brown Thrasher – that ubiquitous ruddy-backed skulker of garden hedgerows throughout the southeastern United States – possesses one of the largest song repertoires of any North American songbird; however when you recall that it belongs to the same scientific...
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hummingbirds-really-do-have-feet Before the study of birds formally became the science of ornithology we know it as today, more or less anyone who could write could publish a study declaring one thing or another to be true about birds. Because of this, some pretty strange ideas were considered as facts in those early days, such as the belief that hummingbirds were always...
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Rainbow Lorikeets - The WOW! Factor When it comes to backyard-visiting birds, certain species simply have a higher “wow” factor than others. Painted Buntings, for example, are far more likely to elicit a “wow!” from an observer than would, say, a Song Sparrow. However with some birds, the term wow factor just doesn’t quite suffice; these birds have a WOW! factor. Rainbow Lorikeets As this BirdCam 2.0 image...
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Do Nuthatches Really Hatch Nuts? Of all the birds with descriptive names, most make perfect sense. Swifts are fast. Harriers chase down their prey with speed and agility. Ducks plunge their heads or bodies under the surface of the water in search of food. But do nuthatches, such as this lovely White-breasted Nuthatch recorded by BirdCam 2.0 user squirrelyacres, really try to hatch nuts?   White-breasted Nuthatch Actually,...
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Facebook Caption Contest March 9, 2011 If you have a way with words and like to see the humor in things you'll love our Facebook Caption Contest. Every other Wednesday we post a new photo from the Wingscapes.com photo album to our Facebook photo album. All of these images are actual photos taken by Wingscapes BirdCams, submitted to us by BirdCam users. Head on over to Facebook...
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Saying What We Feel About This Song Sparrow and Mourning Dove There were a number of different things we could have said about this superb image of a Song Sparrow and a Mourning Dove that nancybirdies recently uploaded to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery. We could have explained how while the two birds seem to have very different length necks, their ability to fold their cervical column into an "S" when desired simply...
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Female American Goldfinch Left Holding the Bag When it comes to popular backyard birds, goldfinches are at the top of most people’s favorites list. Whether its the widespread American, the plaintive-voiced Lesser, or the seldom seen Lawrence’s, these little yellow charmers are always a delight wherever and whenever they appear. Audubon BirdCam user Lynne from South Union, Kentucky, recorded this characteristic image of a female American Goldfinch clinging...
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Best BirdCam Photos of 2009 - BirdCammer of the Year Anyone who has been a regular visitor to the Wingscapes BirdCam Photo Gallery over the past year should not be in the least surprised to learn that, as the result of both the number as well as the superb quality of all the wonderful photos he has uploaded this past year, David Lindquist has been selected as the BirdCammer of...
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Birdwatch America or Bust... ...check...1-2-3...is the microphone still turned on? OK, sorry for the long drought of posts. We've been working furiously to prepare for the product launch of the Wingscapes BirdCam at this weekend's Birdwatch America tradeshow in Atlanta. Exactly one year ago, Wingscapes attended this tradeshow as a visitor and discussed the BirdCam concept with potential customers. The feedback we got was...
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WIRELESS BirdCam?!?!?! Read this post. It is important to anyone remotely interested in remote cameras. See the "Photo Albums" on the upper left corner of this webpage? Check out the album  Taken on December 20th, 2007 These photos were automatically uploaded to this blog by a wireless router at my home that received images wirelessly from a Wingscapes BirdCam mounted on our...
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Laughing Gull Makes the BirdCam Life List David from Cary, North Carolina has found another bird for the BirdCam Life List.  Here are some great shots he sent in of some Laughing Gulls "smiling" for the Wingscapes BirdCam. Thanks David! David writes: I would like to claim a new life list species! The attached are photos of Laughing Gulls photographed with my BirdCam at Kure Beach, North Carolina. ...
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...more from Marcus in Orlando... Marcus from Orlando continues to send us great pics that cement his status as one of the better BirdCam photographers out there. Great shots Marcus. Thanks.

Bluebirds and More from Cary, North Carolina David from Cary, North Carolina sent in these great shots of various birds he recorded in his back yard using the Wingscapes BirdCam. Thanks David! David writes: Here's more of my favorite shots with the BirdCam.  All were photographed at my home in Cary, North Carolina.

Stretching Doves, Posing Cardinal from Florida Pam from Malabar, Florida continues to send us great shots of birds and other wildlife that visit her yard. Thanks Pam! Pam writes: I know you have the Mourning Dove on your life list, but thought this picture from the BirdCam was especially pretty. My husband Richard gave me the BirdCam for Christmas, and we let it take pictures every day. It’s always...
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