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 be entered into the contest we’re sponsoring with Bird Watcher’s Digest to win one of these remarkable new feeders. Even if you aren’t the lucky winner of the new AutoFeeder, you may still win one of twenty runner-up prizes - and everyone who enters will receive a discount coupon for the Wingscapes.com store.
So take notes if you’d like, and if you’re sitting comfortably, we will start the film. 3… 2… 1…
For more videos about our products, please visit the Wingscapes YouTube and Facebook pages.
When it comes to seeing the colors of the world around us, scientists at Arizona State University have discovered that women not only see red more vividly than men but that they can also distinguish more subtle hues of it from one another, as mentioned in this article.
It’s thought that this difference goes far back in time to humans being hunter-gatherers. Women, being the gatherers, were more successful in collecting fruits and berries for the clan if they could accurately distinguish the shades of red that told the difference between ripe berries and varieties of poisonous ones.
It would also help them to distinguish the shades of red that might simply indicate that something that looked tasty - such as this Trinidad Scorpion chili pepper, recorded by Wingscapes TimelapseCam 8.0 enthusiast Vince at Real Vince Samios - was actually very painful to eat.
Every July, Chinook Salmon make their way from the Pacific Ocean up rivers all along the western coast of North America on their annual migration to their spawning grounds. However when those swimming up the Yukon River reach Whitehorse in Canada’s Yukon Territory, they run into a bit of an obstacle: the Whitehorse Dam.
Fortunately, as salmon are such an important part of both the Canadian economy and culture, a fish ladder, the longest wooden fish ladder in the world, was constructed to allow these migrating salmon to make their way past the dam and continue on their way up the Yukon to lay their eggs and help to ensure the continuation of the species.
Click here to view the Chinook Salmon Cam
However in addition to helping the salmon swim past the dam, the fish ladder is also a great place for locals and tourists alike to get a look at the migrating fish as they swim through the ladder. Yukon Energy has even established an on-line fish cam to enable people all over the world to witness this amazing migration.
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 months of winter and posted to her BirdingVideos YouTube page.
Just look at all the snow on those trees and the bright colors of the woodpeckers as they can only be seen through the crisp, cold air of a mid-winter’s day. Doesn’t that just make you want to go put on a sweater and make some cocoa?
Those who follow the birding blogosphere will likely already know Amy from her Magnificent Frigatebird blog, where she posts quite a variety of Wingscapes photos she’s recorded with her BirdCam. She can also be found on Twitter under the handle Birdorable.
Many thanks for the cool video Amy. Don't forget to check Wingscapes Youtube channel, Facebook page and Twitter for more cool stuff as we move foward into fall!
Thanks to the flash feature on the Wingscapes BirdCam 2.0, we’ve had a few - and highly prized - images of those elusive nocturnal creatures, the flying squirrels, shared with us in the BirdCam Photo Gallery and the Wingscapes Facebook page. Joyce from Weymouth, Massachusetts recently uploaded the first image that shows just how these animals got their well-deserved name.
Of course, flying squirrels don’t truly fly so much as glide. When their limbs are extended, a membrane between their fore and hind legs stretches out and gives them roughly the shape of a square kite which allows them to glide from one place to the next.
Indeed, seeing them gracefully soaring through the air with their outstretched limbs reaching for their desired landing spot, it’s not difficult to understand how Olympic gymnastics champion Gabby Douglas got her “Flying Squirrel” nickname.
Those of us willing to admit that we were of a sufficient age to remember the year 1976 will likely recall a song about a dance-crazy waterfowl by a Memphis disc jockey named Rick Dees that made it to the top of the singles charts that year.
Mercifully, the dance craze that inspired Mr. Dees has long since passed; however its unmistakeable moves inspired time-lapse enthusiast Vince Samios to title one of his recent Wingscapes TimelapseCam 8.0 videos Disco Cucumber and set it to an appropriate soundtrack.
Vince has quite a growing collection of interesting time lapse and innovative gardening videos on his YouTube channel. We’ll be visiting it regularly to discover his latest production. Be assured that we’ll be including what we find in future posts. In the meanwhile, stop by the Wingscapes Facebook page and Youtube channel for more entertaining time-lapse videos.
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 BirdCam 2.0, Audubon BirdCam, or TimelapseCam 8.0 into position to capture the image or video that could win you one of the contest’s many prizes.
Of course, as you don’t want to disturb nesting birds just to capture an image or video, you’ll want to be sure and first read an article we published on the subject that contains some very important do’s and don’ts about this type of photography.
Naturally, once you’ve selected and submitted your chosen images or videos to Cornell’s contest, we’d also love to see what you’ve recorded; so don’t forget to post an example - such as the one above of nesting Northern Cardinals recorded by Pamela from Pensacola, Florada - or two to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery, our YouTube channel, or our Facebook page.
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 above-mentioned areas occur.
In the case of the molting bird in this image, uploaded to the Wingscapes Photo Gallery by Glenna from Mississauga, Ontario, many of the feathers crucial to its identification are not present. Any guesses as to what it might be?
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 bird of great interest to most birders, the native one – the Band-tailed Pigeon – most certainly is.
Pam from Redwood City, California, was fortunate enough to have had three visit her deck recently and pose for a few BirdCam photos. Thanks for sharing these Pam!
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 back in Europe; hence they called these New World birds by the same name – robins.
John from Farnham Common, UK, however knows perfectly well what Robins really look like and was kind enough to share an image of one he recorded with his BirdCam. Seeing this, we can easily understand how those early settlers might have been confused.