"Adaptable, colorful, and cheery-voiced, House Finches are common from coast to coast today, familiar visitors to backyard feeders. Native to the Southwest, they are recent arrivals in the East. New York pet shop owners, who had been selling the finches illegally, released their birds in 1940 to escape prosecution; the finches survived, and began to colonize the New York suburbs. By 50 years later they had advanced halfway across the continent, meeting their western kin on the Great Plains."
Group of 6 fledgeling finches who think they're still nestlings get their nest taken away to teach them they have wings. They huddle together in a ball of feathers like life depends on it.
Make that 7 finches. Now 8.
One of them (arrived neuro, had a head tilt but that went away) was moved in and examined after found lying on his side one too many times and discovered to be unable to extend one of his legs! Little guy has been walking with his beak and wings!!! He can fly but can't hold onto a perch!!! He lies on his side because his hocks are sore from the hopping and weight-bearing!!
We lament that songbird wheelchairs and physical therapy are not a thing
We give the group a reptarium with lots of soft turfgrass and perches (and accessible food/water dishes) so they discover their wings and stop trampling wing-walker at feeding time. Hopefully this does encourage him enough to get his own version of physical therapy and regain any leg/foot use.
Yesterday, among the hundreds of goldfinches flittering around my backyard. I saw this house finch (Haemorhous mexicanus). I was taken by his coloring, which is a bit more on the orange side than most house finches that I see around here. I only had time for this one shot. The look on the bird's face reminds me of Ben when I'm talking to him, and he just stares back at me.
@birdcounter
You know, the photographs that I post here are not quite a vivid as the same photographs that I post at my pixel's gallery, because here, I reduce the size of the photos and usually make a slight reduction in the quality of the photos to make them easier to load.
Take a look:
https://swede1952-photographs.pixels.com
#496, a young male house finch. I had less time than I wanted, between the osprey and working on a painting for a coworker, so I hope to revisit drawing a teenage bird again when I’m not rushed or struggling to focus.
Requests for birds are open, updates happen on Thursdays.
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