Path: utzoo!censor!isgtec!ted
From: ted@isgtec.uucp (Ted Richards)
Newsgroups: rec.birds
Subject: Re: Hand-feeding wild birds
Message-ID: <737@isgtec.UUCP>
Date: 27 Nov 90 17:50:53 GMT
References: <135667@pyramid.pyramid.com>
Sender: news@isgtec.UUCP
Reply-To: ted@isgtec.UUCP (Ted Richards)
Distribution: rec.birds
Organization: ISG Technologies Inc. Mississauga Ont. Canada
Lines: 31

In article <135667@pyramid.pyramid.com> sandra@pyrtech.pyramid.com (Sandra Macika) writes:
> In article <14182@crdgw1.crd.ge.com> stpeters@dawn.crd.ge.com (Dick St.Peters) writes:
> >Since chickadees seem to be much in the news, what (if any) other bird
> >species, particularly Eastern US species, can be hand fed in the wild
> >by a patient person?

> >Dick St.Peters, GE Corporate R&D, Schenectady, NY
> >stpeters@dawn.crd.ge.com	uunet!dawn.crd.ge.com!stpeters
 
> Blue Jays.
 
Also grey jays (a.k.a. whiskeyjacks).  One year in Algonquin Park, my
wife astounded me by taking some toast out into a clearing in the
woods, holding scraps of it out in her hand, and having ten or more
grey jays swoop out of the woods (one at a time, in quick succession),
land on her hand, and fly away with their prize.

Grey jays live in northern pine forests, so they are primarily a
Canadian bird, but my bird book shows their range extending into the
northern US (Maine and Illinois or Wisconsin? - my geography isn't too
good).

Another possibility is either pine siskins or goldfinches (I can't
remember which).  I know they are quite relaxed around our feeder, and
someone at the store where we buy our seeds (Birdlife Services Inc)
said that they practically had to pick them off their feeder in order
to refill it.  I think they said that some would actually eat out of
their hand.
--
Ted Richards          ...uunet!utai!lsuc!isgtec!ted         ted@isgtec.UUCP
ISG Technologies Inc.   3030 Orlando Dr. Mississauga  Ont.  Canada   L4V 1S8