Hiked at the beautiful Burnidge Forest Preserve this weekend, in Illinois.  I loved, loved, loved walking through their beautiful tall grass prairie and seeing the gorgeous plants there.  The wild grape was bursting with color.

Amid its tangled vines and burning leaves, a cheerful little wren was hopping about.

He or she sang me a happy little good morning song and stayed in front of the mass of shrubbery long enough for me to get a few photos.

Then it was back to work, foraging amongst the branches.  What a way to start the day!

A Wren

This is Awren.

 She was named by a camp staff member out at Loud Thunder - quite cleverly too, I think.

She lives out at the Eco-Con shed, in a birdhouse.  She put up with weeks of Boys Scouts and Cub Scouts and church campers working and playing in close proximity to her home.  Perhaps this is why, as Jason tells me, that she was not afraid of people.  Reportedly, the only time she would fly away was if you actually looked directly into her birdhouse.

Beaks & Bills - Part 1

Can you identify this bird?  I couldn't, at first.  When I photographed it, it was too far away in the trees for me to see it properly.  When I saw this picture up close, thanks to the zoom feature in my photo program, I still had to stop and think about it.  The most easily identifiable feature of this bird was hidden from view on its breast, but I didn't know that.

The back view of this bird was not familiar to me.  All I could see was a black-head bird, a black back with white feathers, and whitish side breasts.  Woodpeckers have black and white backs, but this bird wasn't shaped like a woodpecker.  It was more round.  The beak really gave it away.  It is more massive than a woodpecker's beak.  Sure enough, when I did a little research, I was able to confirm that this is a Red-breasted grosbeak.

Had I seen it from the front, I would have been able to identify it very quickly.  To see what I mean, look here:  http://foundonthetrail.blogspot.com/search/label/Rose-breasted%20Grosbeak .

"Beak" is self-explanatory, but what about "gros"?  It comes from French, and means large, or thick.  Cardinals have this same powerful, cone-shaped beak.  It is a great for cracking open seeds, which is the main part of their diet.

Now take a look at this wren's bill, below.  ("Beak" and "bill" can be used interchangeably, but beaks are more for tearing, like an owl would do with their prey, and bills are more for catching insects from the air.)  You can see how thin and elongated this wren's bill is, compared to the grosbeak above.

Beak and bill shapes can reveal a lot about a bird's diet, and are key features to observe when you are trying to identify birds.

My Eye Is Upon You!

Can you identify this bird?

It has no prominent field marks, but note the slightly curved beak.  It is from the family Troglodytidae, which means "cave dweller".  The photo (above) is a little atypical, because these birds are usually seen holding their tails upright in a perky way.

Here's a pair.

Have you guessed it yet?  Yep!  These are wrens.  And as you can see, the male and female look the same.  They have no obvious sexual dimorphism.

Something interesting about wrens is that the male will build more than one nest, and then when he gets a mate, he will let her pick the one she likes best.  They may nest inside cavities but have a strong preference for manmade birdhouses.  So much so, that if you are building bluebird houses, you need to make the entrance hole according to the exact dimensions called for, or wrens will take them over in a heartbeat.  (I learned this while working on an Eagle Scout project!)

Wrens can be very fierce, as you can tell from the following photo.

It's pretty clear that this wren is saying, "Back Off!!!"  I was further away than it looks, using my zoom lens, but I got the message loud and clear, and gave this little family a wide berth.

The word wren has a fascinating etymology.  Here's the trail:  Old English wraenna, from Old High German wrendo & wrendilo, from the Icelandic rindill.  I just love trailing these words back through the centuries.  Aren't they beautiful?