Good to know! I know there aren’t too many species out and about in the cold here but there’s bound to be something to find.
Well, if the botanical gardens have feeders, you should do well. Or you could look for a local Audubon refuge.
We struck out on our falcon. But we did sign up for a birding trip (you can only drive a private vehicle on a very small portion of the reserve) next Thursday. According to the good folks there this trip generally sees a pair of them, so hope runs rampant.
Later in the spring, when the camera is turned on, I should send you the link to a falcon cam here in our city. The power company has a nesting box with two cameras, one inside and one outside the box, and the video runs 24/7. Last year the peregrines raised three young successfully!
I saw a rough-legged hawk (in central PA) on Thursday - first one I’ve seen in a couple of years.
Bumping this thread to sharesome photos I’ve taken over the last few weeks while out looking for birds. As Finagle mentioned upthread, the Botanical Garden did indeed have feeders which is where I found a lot of goldfinches and some juncos. Also found some cardinals in the area.
Still new at bird photography so my settings weren’t the best (and the light was less than ideal) but hopefully I’ll improve quickly.
We had two acorn woodpeckers on our pine tree this weekend. OK, that’s not groundshaking, but I’ve never seen one in this area (Poway valley west of the mountains). We commonly get Nuttal’s woodpeckers, but no others.
Nice shots, Bob Ducca! It’s tough shooting in that kind of flat light, I took some shots yesterday, a fairly overcast afternoon, and had the same kind of results.
I saw 39 species yesterday! Nothing extremely rare or unusual, but a bit more than the usual coot-mallard-sparrow list. I’ve only been in the US for 6 years, so am still learning the bird fauna. I love it when my brain clicks, and the name of the bird I’m seeing pops on to my tongue!
I’ve been submitting my lists to eBird starting in Jan, and I must say, I do like the interface. I don’t usually make a checklist during my trip, I just make an effort to get a photo, even a crappy one, of every species I see, then as I go through the shots, transcribe into the eBird submission form.
Nice, I really like the shot of the hawk (falcon?). Too bad that owl was hiding from the camera but a neat spotting regardless. I hear we have some snowy owls near the lake so I’m going to go looking for them this weekend.
I’ve been using eBird also and it’s been really helpful in giving me an idea of what’s out and about this time of year.
Thanks, that’s a red-shouldered hawk, a little smaller than a red-tail, and more likely to be in under the trees. She (I think she, quite large) didn’t mind me coming quite close, and I took several hundred shots of her before I walked on. This was my favourite.
And the owl! It was right at the far end of my zoom, but I took a bunch of shots anyway, thinking the whole time, it’s not even an owl, it’s just a broken branch… Wasn’t til I got home and zoomed in that I confirmed my sighting 
I saw a few more great horned owls this trip. I was hoping for a short-eared, as they apparently live on this reserve… maybe next time!
Well, it’s not rare, but we had a European Starling visit our suet feeder this morning for the first time. At first glance I thought it was a crow, but then spotted the yellow bill and speckled back. Unfortunately, they tend to go after eggs and young of other birds like chickadees.
The OP mentioned southern Arizona. I was recently on Portal (SE corner) and saw quite a few birds I’d never seen before, or heard of for that matter, although that’s not saying much.
Apparently you get a confluence of biomes around there, plus migration paths, that make for good viewing.
I had a nice bird day from my kitchen table! Looking out the sliding door into the rainy back patio, I saw lots of crows, some gulls, a few chickadees, juncos (they nested out there last year, might be scoping out sites for this season), hummingbirds, house finches, and, my fave, Townsend’s warblers. One of my birdy ambitions this year was to pay better attention to, and start being more thorough when IDing, backyard twitterers.
Then, while walking the dogs in brief breaks between showers, I visited with the resident local mockingbird, who is competing with a black phoebe for ownership of a neighbour’s chimney.
Yes, it’s spring in the Bay Area