I've managed to photograph a number of the creatures visiting our yard lately. At first I tried to go outside to photograph them, but they would take off as soon as I appeared, if not as soon as the door opened. I've had a bit more luck staying inside and shooting through the windows. That's not ideal, but it can work surprising well.
The first visitors were three Northern Flickers. Only one of them stuck around long enough for me to get my camera. This looks like a female red-shafted. Confusingly, yellow-shafted females are the ones with red on their head. Flickers are woodpeckers but they feed on the ground mostly on ants and beetles. I'm not sure if this one was finding much but he was digging around vigorously. Northern Flickers are the only North American woodpeckers that are strongly migratory, moving south for the winter.
A robin managed to photobomb one shot.
As you can see in this photo, woodpeckers feet are zygodactyl, with four toes, the first and the fourth facing backward and the second and third facing forward - good for grasping trees.
There were also some Golden-crowned sparrows, which are apparently common, but I haven't noticed them before. They are related to White-crowned sparrows which I see more often.
I was working at my computer when I noticed a couple of hummingbirds go by the window. I didn't pay too much attention since I've seen them briefly other times. But this time they settled on the bush just outside the window. I thought I might be able to get some photographs, but as soon as I stood up to get my camera they left. This happened several times. Eventually I got my camera and kept it on the desk beside me. They came back again and this time I managed to slide out of my chair to the floor and start taking photos. They came back a few more times. I'm not sure if they got accustomed to me, or I got better at moving without scaring them. In the end I was resting my lens against the window only a few feet away from them. I assume this Anna's Hummingbird was a female since it didn't have the brighter colors of the males. I wondered why they were hanging around so much, but then Shelley spotted a new hummingbird feed at one of our neighbors.
Later in the day, a couple of young male Black-tailed mule deer were in the yard. They were quite "full of beans" as my mother would have said. (Which I see may have originally referred to coffee beans.) They were butting heads and, as Shelley described it, bouncing around like kangaroos. (Also known as "pronking" or "stotting".) One of them only had one antler.
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