A Bobwhite's Greeting

One of the beautiful things that comes from paying attention to the world around you is that you gain a sense of what is normally there.  Once you have that sense of the typical, or the normal, or the most common, you gain the power of recognizing new things.  Or, if you are lucky, even slightly different things.

Or the call of a Northern Bobwhite, a bird that we have never heard or seen on the farm before.

I first noticed their call while I was working in the office on Friday (with the windows open of course).  I was concentrating on what I was doing, not just sitting around wishing I was doing something else and letting anything and everything distract me.  Somehow, part of my brain recognized that something different was making its voice known and realized, fairly quickly, that this was a new bird call for me at the Genuine Faux Farm.

It is possible I've heard this bird before - but that was probably a time years ago when my birdsong recognition was much less than it is now.  Happily, I also have access to the Merlin app that showed me, much to my delight, that this was, indeed, a Bobwhite.

It is not uncommon for a new bird to stop by our farm and then be gone the next day.  In fact, we had a Wood Thrush sing happily at our farm for exactly ONE day.  So, we were delighted to hear the Bobwhites again on Saturday.  Then we saw them running around the northern portion of our farm.  On my way out to bring the chickens some food, I noticed one bird foraging near our compost piles and I snapped a quick (and blurry) picture with my phone.  I figured that was going to be my prize shot to prove to myself that we actually were seeing a Northern Bobwhite.

Eventually, I went to get the camera in the off chance that I would have a better opportunity.  Then this happened.

A little call and response between two different Northern Bobwhite on the farm.  That was pretty cool.  Then I slowly eased my way around the tree and bush at the right of the video until I could see the bird that was singing - and I took a photo that I could blow up so you could see our new little friend.

This bird stopped it's signature "bob? bob WHITE!" call once it understood it was seen.  About all it managed for a while was a quiet "bob?" and then silence.

It did not leave and simply went about preening.  In fact, a few of these birds walked into Valhalla (our larger high tunnel) while Tammy was in there picking beans.  She actually had to escort them out of the building and was only a few feet from them as she did so.

While these are neat little birds, we are really pleased by their presence because their numbers have been in sharp decline, despite the fact that they can have two or three broods a year of young.  The main cause of their decline is the removal of habitat.

Well, I guess our farm has become friendlier for Northern Bobwhite.  

I can live with that.