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More Information about the Eastern Towhee

May 7, 2009 By

So, as I’ve mentioned in some previous posts, the Eastern Towhee has been an infrequent visitor to our feeder area at best.  I became interested in learning more about this bird, as I’ve seen at least one nearly every day for the last week. I  was wondering, why are they hanging around here more now?  I also was wondering why one of my older bird identification books listed the bird as the “Rufous Sided Towhee” and another book listed it as the Eastern Towhee. 

For anyone who is unfamiliar with the Eastern Towhee, here is one image of a towhee at my bird feeder area recently.

Eastern Towhee

So, naturally, I started with a google search for information on Towhee’s.  I landed at one of my favorite sites for information on bird species, bird identification and birdwatching, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.  If you haven’t visited this great site, or if you haven’t participated in Project FeederWatch, please check it out.  Anyways, their information on the Eastern Towhee is really fantastic.  One of the most interesting things that I learned is that the Eastern Towhee is the “newer name”. Both the Eastern Towhee and the western Spotted Towhee used to be known as the Rufous Sided Towhee (prior to 1995).  I’m glad that I wasn’t crazy in thinking that this bird was a “Rufous Sided Towhee”! 

I also learned that this bird really enjoys loose edges, the leaf covered edges of the forest, and areas where there is a lot of scrub brush.  That basically describes our backyard feeder environment to a tee!  I can’t believe we weren’t seeing these birds more often! 

I learned that population of the Eastern Towhee has been declining due to surburban sprawl.  Let’s face it, most homeowners don’t care for loose edges and lots of leaf litter on the ground.  It makes me happy that we are able to provide a suitable habitat for these little guys. My new goal is to try and get a video of their backward hop. They scratch with both feet through the leaf litter and make a LOT of noise and commotion sometimes doing this.  It is one of the easiest ways for me to spot them.  Sometimes they are just thrashing about in the edge of the woods behind our red shed.  Seeing the Eastern Towhee practicing this foraging behavior is birdwatching at its best. 

I’ve been having a lot of fun photographing these small ground dwelling birds, so check out our online photo gallery for lots more pictures. 

I’m very excited about the possibility of this Eastern Towhee nesting in our area.  It will be great to add this bird to our list of “daily visitors”.  They are quite fun to watch and listen to. 

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The First Oriole of 2009 & Better Towhee Pictures!

May 3, 2009 By

So, we put out the grape jelly on Saturday in a small dish.  Then, on Sunday we had our first visitor! I cannot locate the Oriole Nectar Feeder, apparently I might have thrown it out because it was kind of dirty after last season.  I could only photograph this bird  through the glass door, so the picture is a little weird.

Male Baltimore Oriole      Male Baltimore Oriole

 

 

Also, the Eastern Towhee was back again on Sunday!  We were outside and he was right in the feeder area, so we were able to get some much better pictures!  Enjoy!

Eastern Towhee      Eastern Towhee

 

Eastern Towhee

So, get out there and start enjoying your bird feeders! It is a great season for birdwatching. I’m hoping to get some good looks at the young birds that are around this spring.

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Eastern Towhee In the Backyard

April 25, 2009 By

We fed the birds last night and so today was a pretty good birdwatching day.  We also used the last of our thistle seed last night and the last of the sunflower seed, so I’m going to start tracking my seed usage and costs to get a handle on that.  Also, to share that information with people that are interested in beginning to watch birds.  It can get a little expensive sometimes. 

Anyways, today was a great day.  I got the flower bed alongside the red shed cleaned out.  The day lilies are coming up nicely, but I think that I lost my foxglove over the winter.  There were a lot of worms in the bed and I loosened up the soil to get ready to plant some annuals.  Steve cleaned out the gutters on the house and put up the aerial dog tie out. I think that Quincy is really going to like that.  She’ll be able to move about the backyard better. 

After we came inside and were cooking dinner, I saw an unusual visitor to the backyard, an Eastern Towhee.  He was in the flower bed that I had just cleaned out either finding seeds or insects. He came back several times, going between the red shed flower bed and a brush pile just inside of the tree line.  I never saw him do the signature towhee move according to my bird book, the double leg hop or scoot backwards.  I have only ever observed this bird one other time here, and that was last spring.  Maybe they just migrate through this area and don’t really stay. 

We also saw the wounded toad from last night again.  We had put him in the flower bed near the red shed last night, but today he was on the side porch.  Steve set him down in the dirt by the red shed.  I am sure that he is the same toad from last night.  We picked him up to make sure because we could see some marks on the side of his body. 

It has been raining now all afternoon, so later this evening, Quincy and I will have to go out on a toad hunt. We’ve been hearing lots of calling, but have checked every night and not seen any toads, other than our wounded one. Hopefully, I’ll have more to report later.

Filed Under: BirdWatching, Toads Tagged With: ,