Time to Eat

I really like this photo of a female cardinal caught with a large seed in her mouth. It's almost the same dimension as her eyeball, isn't it? Cardinals are such lovely colorful birds and I am happy to provide them with food during the long dark winter months. But dang. It's getting a little freaky in my backyard. Yesterday I glanced out the kitchen window and as usual there was a cardinal sitting on the bird feeder, busy excavating black sunflower seeds, and one picking around on the snow beneath the feeder, catching the good fall-off. But the odd thing was--the bushes all around the yard were filled with cardinals. Bright red, pale drab, red with brownish wings--there they all were, more than I could count, all quietly watching their species mate enjoy himself. Then, swoop! Another cardinal's turn! And so it went--quiet observing, then sudden flight. Quiet observing, sudden flight.

Guess word is out on the sweet new platform James built onto the feeder.