Brown Creeper Sighting

I have been preparing for a Celebrate Urban Birds weekend, at the suggestion of a fellow home school mom. Our kit just arrived today, and it reminded me that we saw a brown creeper yesterday.

I watched it creep up and around our ash tree, thinking, "What kind of nuthatch is that?" Then it dawned on me that it was not a nuthatch. I tried to point the bird out to my daughters for what seemed like forever before they saw it on our ash tree. The feathers make a perfect camouflage.

We feel quite special after reading that brown creepers are rarely seen. Rather, they are heard, like many birds. I am not sure if the creeper was interested in our suet. I read that they are mostly insectivorous, and "A" and I noted that it was pecking as it crept up the tree trunk. The bird eventually left for the evergreen coverage of either our back tree or the neighbor's hedge. They blend in together and share space along the fence.

Celebrate Urban Birds looks interesting. You are asked to ID only 15 different kinds of birds, and there is a survey form to fill in. Much easier than when we participated in the Great Backyard Bird Count a few years ago. That covered every kind of the bird you saw, and data was entered online. Paper is quite convenient -- when I see the paper sitting out, I remember to look for birds.

We've seen northern flickers at the base of our trees and on the ground, and our usual family of cardinals at our feeder and in our trees. We know it is the same family because one of the three is whitish. It looks chalky with a red bill. We've seen it since we moved here.

Happy birding, everyone!