Data Entry Contest: Describe How You Became Interested in Birds!
For the sixth season in a row, Project FeederWatch and our sponsor Wild Birds Unlimited are rewarding registered FeederWatchers with the chance to win prizes. After entering bird counts (data) into the FeederWatch website, participants have the opportunity to share a story, memory, or tip by clicking the “Enter to Win” button on the Count Summary page. This year, we’re randomly selecting two winners per prompt. Our third Data Entry contest prompt was:
Describe how you became interested in birds. Do you have a “spark” bird? Tell us how it all began!
Congratulations to our winners, Mark Mattingly and John Leith!
Mark shared:
While stationed in Washington D.C. in the Army, I built a bird feeder in our company’s maintenance shop in my spare time. Little did I realize then, at age 18, that I’d be feeding the birds for the next fifty years. I once had three Pileated Woodpeckers at my suet feeder at one time. They even remained long enough for me to take their picture. And things just kept getting better and better.
There are many different feeder types you can choose from when planning to feed birds. From suet cages to platform feeders, different birds have different preferences. We’ve got great resources to help you find what feeder will work best for you! Check out our Feeder Birds page to see the different feeder types you can choose from, and to learn about the type of feeder each bird prefers, click on your target bird using our Common Feeder Birds Interactive tool.
John shared how his father helped him become interested in birds:
I have been interested and passionate about nature and birds since I was quite young (maybe around 5-6 years old). I’m now 67 years old. It all started with my father taking me for almost daily walks down the Redhill Creek in Hamilton every evening after his postal route was finished. He would point out to me the Ring-necked Pheasants roosting in the trees as it was getting dark, and the animal tracks we would spot in soft soil and snow. It absolutely amazed me and I was hooked. I have been a bird watcher and nature nut ever since. Thanks, Dad! Rest in peace.
Birdwatching is a great way to foster a love of nature. Ensuring your backyard is wildlife-friendly can benefit more than just birds. For more information on easy steps you can take to help, read these Seven Simple Actions To Help Birds.
Thanks to everyone who participated and shared their stories – we wish we could share them all! We will pick two winners each month through April 2022. Check out the contest page after you submit your count on FeederWatch.org to view the next story prompt, and stay tuned for the announcement of our next winners on Tuesday, March 15, 2022! Using the app? You can access the Count Summary page, which contains the link to the contest, by signing in to our website, clicking “View or Edit Previous Counts,” clicking “Actions” and then “View” for a count that has already been submitted. Email feederwatch@cornell.edu with questions.
Interested in becoming a FeederWatcher? Join the fun now!
10 comments on “Data Entry Contest: Describe How You Became Interested in Birds!”
For as long as I can remember my Mum & I have enjoying talking walks in the woods what I really enjoyed were all the birds I saw on our trips. My Mum taught me the basics of bird watching like how to ID the common birds. Then when I got my own place, I started putting out seed & suet for the birds & was surprised at the variety of birds that I had never seen before. I thank my Mum every chance I get for getting me into bird watching!
I I have enjoyed birds as long as I can remember but like many people I started watching more carefully and frequently during the pandemic lockdown.
I I am lucky enough to have a large yard that backs on to a wooded area. I enjoy gardening and have a few birdbaths. My curiosity was spiked in the spring of 2020 when I noticed a trio of crows that regularly visited one of the birdbaths and after they left the water was always murky and in need of freshening up. It seemed that they were washing something in the water. I started leaving a few peanuts at the side of the birdbath which they came to retrieve each day mid-afternoon. They came less frequently as the summer progressed however, my curiosity was sparked and I started researching. I came across the Cornell website and lectures by Keven Gavin which I found enlightening. Since then I have continued to learn about birds and joined the Feederwatch program. Although the colorful songbirds might catch your eye more readily, for me Crows were the birds that got me hooked on birding.
I was in a new relationship with a fanatical birdwatcher. We decided to drive across country in a station wagon with a canoe on top and pulling a pop-up tent camper. We watched birds from snowy New England in February down the East Coast to Florida, and then across the South to Texas and the whooping cranes and finished the trip 3 months later in Northern California. I learned so much, listening to him calling in Great Horned Owls from a nocturnal canoe expedition on lake Okeechobee and enjoying shorebirds in Florida and California. I got hooked on it. Many years later I volunteer for our local raptor center and enjoyed a bevy of bluebirds today in my birdbath in Santa Fe.
I became interested in watching and learning about birds at age 54. And I am so glad I did. I birdwatch daily and appreciate how much there is to learn and discover about birds. It is seemingly endless intrigue and discovery.
For years, I worked full time and attended college and graduate school during the evenings. I opened my own firm to free up time to pursue interests and hobbies, including travel, nature, art, animal rescue volunteer work, etc.
Soon after I returned home from a trip to the Amazon rainforest in Peru, I heard an “exotic jungle-type bird sound.” My cat saw the bird through the window and I followed his eyes to see a beautiful male Nuttall’s Woodpecker at my Southern California townhouse. The woodpecker was in a palm tree right in front of my window – inches from my eyes. I was amazed at its beauty, markings, colors and how it danced around the tree, making its cheerful, proud sounds.
I had a beginner’s bird guide and looked in it to confirm my belief that was a type of woodpecker. I misidentified it as a Ladder-Back Woodpecker, later to be informed by a bird guide that they are found in arid regions and that what I saw is a Nuttall’s – only found in California. From then on, I made an effort to notice birds in my yard and tried to identify them. I purchased the National Geographic bird guide and good binoculars and have been hooked on birding ever since. I watch birds daily and have a feeder which attracts house finches, Mourning Doves, California Towhee, White Crowned Sparrows in winter, Acorn Woodpeckers (they like to feed their babies blueberries that I leave for them,) an occasional oak titmouse and Western Scrub Jay and a very occasional Mountain Chickadee (whose song is my phone ring tone.)
Nine years ago, I downsized to a condo and have advocated fiercely for the large homeowners association to stop chopping down trees unless necessary and to stop trimming the trees during spring and summer: breeding season of birds and other creatures. I advised the HOA about the federal law against harming or interfering with migratory birds, nests, etc. and they have made it a policy to not allow the landscapers to interfere with any birds or nests, and to trim trees during spring and summer. I provided a printout of tree trimming advice provided by Sea and Sage Audubon Society (found on their website) to the HOA and that helped convince them to respect birds.
I have been inspired by the beauty and resilience of birds, especially migratory birds. The colors and patterns of birds is endlessly beautiful and inspiring.
I try to inform others about tree trimming/cutting, bird breeding season and migratory birds. We can all do our part to help birds and the environment. Because so many people don’t know about birds, their destruction of their habitat, etc. is not done with malice, but because they just don’t know. Let’s get the word out about birds! It’s never too late to learn. Happy Birding!!!!
Dear Kristine,
With a “forever love” of birds,…reading your story was so heartwarming. Many yard birds grace my yard; Ravens, Chickadees, Finches and various Sparrows. I provide nourishing seed at the northern coast of California, where Winter can be tough. I like to believe caring for them is part of helping nature through climate changes; that they will be healthier during nesting and/or for a long migration journey. What you’ve done is truly inspiring. The extent of your efforts are meaningful. You’ve protected your neighborhood birds, and the trees that they need. If only we could spread our appreciation – and the necessity to our survival – of wild birds. I imagine a dream world in which birds matter.
As a child our parents always fed the birds and we knew all the names of the locals including the ducks and raptors. After I got married my husband and I always fed the birds while living in semi isolation beside Fundy National Park we had dogs and birds galore the gray jays got as much dog food as the birds. We raised a Raven that Keith found on the ground and it would come right in the house with us. Mother raven kept watching till Corvus Corax #3 could fly and they flew away together. Every where we lived we fed all birds now in my 15th year with project feeder watch we still feed. Protect and photograph all the birds including the ducks eagles etc. we live at the end of a road right on the river so Osprey’s have nested on the Reid Mill 50’ smoke stack for as long as we have lived here 28 years
When I was a southern-Ohio lad about ten years old I asked my parents’ permission to join our local naturalist, Charles Goslin, on weekly early morning bird walks in a large park near where we lived. The bird walks commenced at six in the morning, so I had to be up and in the park by six a.m. As an active Boy Scout, I thought I might earn a Merit Badge. (I did not.) But those weekly early-morning walks with Charlie instilled in me a lifetime of rising early and getting out to see what was going on in the natural world.
Now, I am 81 and living in Florida and still rising at 5:30 a.m. to check my feeders. Although the birds continue to keep me fascinated, I have never kept a “life list” or joined another bird-watching group.
We live at the edge of a marsh and this morning two Red-Shouldered Hawks courted above our feeder trees, yellow-throated Warblers dined on my peanut butter treats and Snowy Egrets dipped their beaks in the marsh water. Tufted-Titmice and Black-capped Chickadees, northern Cardinals and Carolina wrens dropped in to check out our feeders.
I have always been interested in birds. My mom created an interest at an early age, I remember her pointing the different kinds to me. When I attended DePauw University in Greencastle, IN, our school required us to do a course between semesters. I, being a music major, choose clarinet lessons which became impossible when I fell down a flight of stairs and I broke my finger. One of the classes still open was “Armchair Birdwatching “. I decided to take it. We saw over 22 types of birds in the winter mind you. I loved this class and all that I learned while taking it. Now my whole family is involved in knowing about, feeding and watching all types of birds.
Back when we lived in the city, I decided to hang a feeder on our second floor deck just to see what would pop up. I was not a birdwatcher at the time and knew little about identifying birds. I dusted off a copy of National Geographics’s Guide to North American birds and got to it. At first there were lots of house sparrows but as I would patiently observe the feeder, I noticed new visitors – house finches, starlings, chipping sparrows, chickadees, cardinals, downy woodpeckers, goldfinches… I was amazed and hooked! At one point there was some drama when a Cooper’s Hawk attacked our feeder! He did not succeed in catching a bird but stayed in a nearby tree for quite a while.
Last year we moved to a small country town. My good old bird friends from the city are here in the country too, joined by some birds that are new to me – titmice, hairy woodpeckers, bluejays… and more to discover! There is also a large pond close by and, on one occasion, a blue heron appeared. I hope to spend more time there observing aquatic birds.
We are about to embark on a landscaping project for our new home and birds will be a prime consideration – we hope to plant more trees and bushes, including fruit-bearing ones.
How would I have known that with that first feeder in the city, I would embark on a wonderful discovery of nature!
It was 1950, and I was twelve years old, when my Mom bought me the Golden Book for identifying birds. I studied it often. Then, we put up a cottage at a lake in Connecticut. We got to recognize all the birds that came by to eat. One Catbird became a steady visitor and would eat raisins from our hands. He returned each spring for several years, and would come to everybody in my family, squawking for some raisins. They are sassy birds!
I now live in the Blue Ridge mountains of North Carolina in a retirement community. There are fewer species here than at my former North Carolina mountain abode, which was on a wooded mountainside. However, as more trees are planted here, more birds keep arriving!