Feed the birds,tuppence a bag

This morning is bright and shiny and beautiful! The sun is making the snow sparkle and has been much needed. Lately, I have been feeding our local bird population. I've been enjoying reading others' blogs about their own bird feeding adventures, so I will give you a peek out my back door.

This big blue spruce is a perfect perching spot for the birds.

The bird feeders this year consist of a new one which I received for Christmas with a tube for the seed and an outer "fence" to keep squirrels out, a suet feeder, and the feeder table. I really like the new bird feeder, but squirrels can just come and feast from the table anyway. Generally I get a lot of juncos, chickadees and doves.

I always know when the bluejays are in the vicinity because the smaller birds scatter and let these large "bully birds" have first dibs.

A snowy, blurry bluejay.

I often get little downy woodpeckers and nuthatches. I adore how the nuthatches approach the feeder by coming down the tree headfirst.

I particularly enjoy the cardinals. Like couples who do everything together, the cardinals show up in pairs. The male is always easy to spot with his brilliant red coat, and the female is identified by her crest, orangy red beak, and her dull reddish colouring.

male cardinal below the feeder table

the cardinal and his wife

Another blogger, Sue in Suffolk, had some redpoles at her place. I've had those in the past but have not seen any this year. Other birds that I have had in the past, who have kept their distance this year are pileated woodpeckers. They are stunning birds, larger and more "pointy" than the little downies.

an internet image of a pileated woodpecker

Finally, the title of my blog comes from the movie, Mary Poppins. When our daughter was young, this was perhaps her favourite movie. We had the video and it was viewed countless times. She started dance at four years old, and even at that young age, she would prepare her costumes and props ahead of time so she would be ready to dance along with the choreography in various parts of the movie. No, she wasn't as precise as Julie Andrews and Dick Vandyke, but she gave it her all. When her brother was old enough, she would coerce him into doing scenes with her, the favourite being the "Step in Time" scene on the rooftops. "Feed the Birds" refers to a scene where an elderly lady is selling bags of bird food (bread crumbs?) and young Michael wants to spend his money on a bag. His banker father tells him to invest his money instead. The song itself is melancholy and sweet and it is in my head now. There is a line that has the words, "the saints, the apostles" in it. My sweet daughter always thought it was, "the saints, the opossums". Of course, those are the words we sing instead. So whenever I mention to my husband that I'm going to go out to feed the birds, he sings back a little of the song. "Feed the birds, tuppence a bag."

from Mary Poppins