Your Backyard DVD Giveaway

Kingdom Arrows is having an AWESOME giveaway for the video Your Backyard, which identifies 18 feeder birds, their calls and habits.  The giveaway starts today until April 6.  Fly over there and enter!

Visit Crowes Nest Media to see all the goodies, and you can purchase this DVD for only $12 for the next week, use the code, Tweet.

Heather

Having Fun with My New Camera!

Duck,

Duck,

GEESE!

I have a new camera!

Hooray!

Happy Photographing!

Dawn

Raising Mealworms

This is a very fun topic and I can tell you anyone can raise mealworms.  I can't even grow anything in a garden, but I can raise mealworms!

There are many great sites on the how and why of mealworm raising, but I wanted to let you know what we do at the Kingdom Arrow's house.  This is actually my second time of raising them, last year they were growing and multiplying like crazy, but my daughter became ill and I had to cut everything extra out, so I threw them out even after the mealworms had become beetles. 

The way this little project works is, you buy mealworms at a bird store, pet store or gardening shop, and put them in a large plastic box with holes drilled in the lid.  I usually fill it up halfway with uncooked oats.  You can add other goodies like chick feed or wheat germ or other things.  Then, once a week, I add a banana peel to give them some moisture.  Once the banana peel turns black and shrivels, I throw it out and get a new one.

Now, I like to store them under the bed.  They like dark and warm places.  This, however, seems to cause my husband great consternation.

Last year I forgot to tell him they were there and when he went to get out the wrapping paper, he had quite a shock.  He made me promise to always forewarn him in the future!

What the little guys do at this point is molt and grow and eat.  After a few months they will molt into little black beetles, which is when they lay their little eggs.  After a few weeks, the beetles will die, and you just fish them out.  Be sure NOT TO THROW OUT your oats, since the eggs are in there. 

Don't start feeding the birds from your stock for at least 3 months, otherwise you will be using up your main reproducing army.  After about 4-6 months, you will need to throw out your oat mixture and wash out your box.  They do produce a stinking ammonia waste, but just transfer the guys to a clean home and keep going.

Now, I am sure you are asking, Why do I want to grow mealworms (at least my husband always does)?  For the BLUEBIRDS.  They love meal worms.  Soon, (meaning I am waiting on my husband to build), I plan to do a post on my new ground feeders in which I can lay the yummy worms on for the bluebirds.  Speaking of bluebirds, ours have not nested yet.  What are the bluebirds doing where you live?

Heather

Tweet and See: February 2011

Even though March has come in (and truly like a lion), I want to share the Olive Plants' Tweet and See list for February.  Our computers all died at the end of last month, and I had to live in the dark ages without Internet access for two weeks.  Thus the delay.

So without further ado, here's what we saw or heard last month:

1. American Crow
2. Fish Crow
3. Brown-headed Nuthatch
4. Tufted Titmouse
5. Belted Kingfisher
6. Eastern Bluebird
7. Great Blue Heron
8. Red-tailed Hawk
9. Eastern Towhee
10. Carolina Chickadee
11. Pine Warbler
12. Downy Woodpecker
13. Muscovy Duck
14. Mallard Duck
15. Snow Goose
16. Ring-billed Gull
17. Song Sparrow
18. American Robin
19. Rock Pigeon
20. Field Sparrow
21. Pileated Woodpecker
22. Blue Jay
23. Northern Cardinal
24. Yellow-rumped Warbler
25. Northern Mockingbird
26. Mourning Dove
27. Red-winged Blackbird
28. Worm-eating Warbler
29. Common Grackle
30. European Starling
31. Brown Thrasher
32. Cedar Waxwing
33. Black Vulture
34. Turkey Vulture
35. House Finch
36. Tennessee Warbler
37. Chipping Sparrow
38. Canada Goose
39. House Sparrow
40. Carolina Wren
41. Red-bellied Woodpecker
42. Red-headed Woodpecker
43. Bald Eagle
44. Red-shouldered Hawk
45. Killdeer
46. White-breasted Nuthatch
47. Eastern Phoebe
48. Eastern Meadowlark
49. American Coot
50. Double-crested Cormorant

What a fun month!  I hope you saw lots of beautiful birds, too!!  Join Heather on the last day of each month to link in your list.

Now that I am back in the 21st Century, I am working on my next Birding 101 post about Birding by Ear.  I hope you'll fly back over soon! 

Please give a little tweet in the comments and let me know you visited, too.  I would love to meet you and visit your blog.  You can subscribe to Birders for Life, too, so that all the posts we write here will fly directly to your inbox.  Heather and I would love to have you on the B4L team!

Happy Birding!
Dawn

Three Point Landing

The Biding Chicks are are still flitting around, but we are going in so many different directions right now!

BOTH of Dawn's computers are in the shop.  I have been just trying to keep up with my life and had 2 Meme's to post on Kingdom Arrows this week, so that has taken all my brain power.

But,  since it is spring and we are seeing lots of new birds around, I wanted to talk about the Three Point Landing.  I often go to classes about how to attract birds to your yard, and this was a new tidbit for me. 

Here is my best feeding station.

Birds like to come into your feeder and land/hop/fly in a 3 point pattern.  It is important when you set up your feeding station that you have at least 3 places of different heights they can land/fly/hop on.  This can be anything- porch rails, planter, bush, bird bath, etc.  These landing spots can be man-made or God made. 

Once I get my summer feeding station fixed up, I will post a picture.  It has a completely different ethos.

Don't forget Tweet and See for March!

Heather