Quite Time

I was supposed to run a long run today but my knee is still bothering me from Friday's run to work. I pretty sure it is my iliotibial band so I'm in rest mode right now to give it a chance to recover. Because I couldn't run, I had to find some other way to occupy my quite time. Quite time for me are the morning hours up to 10 o'clock on weekend when the wife and kids are still sleeping. I ended up watching a movie but during commercials I would get up and watch the birds feeding at my bird feeders.

Feeding and watching "my" birds is something I enjoying doing. Almost every morning I'll peek outside to see what birds are feeding. I've decided to list the types of birds that visited my backyard this morning.

I saw the following:

• Red Bellied Woodpecker
• Hairy Woodpecker
• Goldfinches
• Mourning Doves
• House Finches
• Northern Cardinals
• Robins
• White Breasted Nuthachs
• Black-capped Chickadees
• Tufted Titmouse

Sometimes I'll have Blue Jays but didn't see any today. I like all of them except for the doves. Those things don't know when to stop eating. I know that all animals need to eat, but I can hardly afford to feed them. Some mornings I'll have four or five eating from my feeder. I can fill up my feeder on Sunday and by Tuesday it's empty. Anyway the other birds makes it worth the cost.

I added a feeding sack filled with nyjer (thistle) seed which is supposed to be just for finches. Sure enough I had five Goldfinches trying to feed off of it at the same time. They loved it. The other birds took turns at the regular feeder filled with sunflower seeds. Even the Red-bellied Woodpecker would come down and take his turn. I think that he is the most beautiful of the bunch. He eats like the Chickadees. He'll come down, grab a seed, and fly away to a tree to eat it. I think I'll put out a cake of suet for him and see how he likes it. I'll let you know.