#Grackle puff

[ostdrossel]

It's Puff Grack season! I love the Grackles, and about a week after their arrival they have started to show off. Please enjoy the Grack Waltz! (Unmute for max fun!)

#birds #backyard birds #Common Grackle #Grackles #Count Grackula #puff #waltz #birdlovers #birds of michigan #birds of north america #birdphotography #nature #Ostdrossel #Friday vibes

[often-lost]

May is fun because you can look out any given window and see at least one horny bird making an absolute fool of himself

#yeah throw some neck dude #puff that collar little man #grackle #pidgin #mourning dove #love bird #birds #nature #spring #may

[noirandchocolate]

There are dozens of grackles on all the neighbors’ trees and roofs and I’m standing in the backyard waving hi to them while they puff up and make their skreenk noises.

Welcome back, friends! I missed you!!

#kidk says stuff #they’re among my favorites #they’re such dorks and their secretive mutterings intrigue me

[swede1952]

Red Winged Blackbird.

My wife and I took a trip to Sunset, Louisiana yesterday. We stopped at a rest area along the way, and I noticed some birds in the area. I snapped some photos. Among the species were boat-tailed grackles, house sparrows, a great egret, and some of these red winged blackbirds.

"One of the most abundant birds across North America, and one of the most boldly colored, the Red-winged Blackbird is a familiar sight atop cattails, along soggy roadsides, and on telephone wires. Glossy-black males have scarlet-and-yellow shoulder patches they can puff up or hide depending on how confident they feel. Females are a subdued, streaky brown, almost like a large, dark sparrow. Their early and tumbling song are happy indications of the return of spring." - allaboutbirds.org

#photography #photographer #birds #birdwatching #birdsofmastodon #birds of north america #birdsphotography #birdphotography #birdlovers #birds nature #birdingphotography #red winged blackbird #backyard birds #bird #bird photography #birding #bird watching #blackbird

[pizzaback]

other birds attracting mates: build an elaborate nest woven from twigs and found objects, perform an elaborate choreographed dance with 2 other birds, find the shiniest most beautiful pebble on the beach to give as a gift

grackles: puff up and scream as loud as possible

#op

[that-fema-corps-blog]

Day 116

November 26, 2022

We were going to go to a rainforest today; however, the one we were looking at was at the base of a mountain and would have been in a flash flood zone. It appeared like it might rain, so we drove through San Lorenzo and visited beaches on the south side of the island instead. (Picture is of an area we passed on the way there.)

We went swimming for a couple hours and then drove to a restaurant a few minutes away. There are many Greater Antillean grackles wherever we go. I’m not sure what exactly, but something about them doesn’t seem quite right. Maybe it’s the way their tails fold sideways or they puff up and stare directly up at the sky, as if the sun was giving them prophetic visions… Plus there are usually tons of them, like a scene out of The Birds.

I found a few shell and bone fragments on the shore beside the restaurant. There were also strange sea plants that had dried into hard white plates. A couple of them came in strings of leaves that were connected as if they were an animal’s backbone. I might try making some jewelry out of them.

#fema corps #birding #puerto rico #round 2 #sightseeing

[cloverthecommongrackle]

this guy, as many would figure out by appearance alone, is a version of Wheatley. this au was originally a crossover between Avatar and Portal, and hes a newly discovered species called Aviarians. Full species info below

Aviarians(Elytro-sapiens aviari(variants would be like Elytro-sapiens aviari Quiscalus, Quiscalus being grackles.)) appear to be half human and half bird, but Aviarians aren't related to humans or birds, though they are mammals, like humans. They keep a mostly human appearance, but with feathers covering their neck and cheeks. They have wings, with a wingspan of four times their height. The skin on their arms from their elbows down is tough and almost scaly, like a bird. Despite the looks, it is simply thick grey skin, not actual scales. Instead of nails, they have long, hooked black claws, like an eagle. Most Aviarians have long tail feathers, long enough to drag on the ground. Aviarian legs are digitigrade, like a bird, with the same tough, grey, and almost scaly skin as their hands and forearms. That also means that their ankles are much higher, where the knees would be if they were plantigrade. It sort of gives the illusion that their knees are backwards, but their actual knees are higher up. They also have talons on their feet. And of course, they don't wear shoes, since nothing would be comfortable with bird feet. All Aviarians blush a different color, despite Aviarian blood being red. This is caused by different chemical reactions. It normally triggers a release of luciferin in the area, which makes Aviarian blush bioluminescent. Aviarians can also have bioluminescence in other places, even in feathers. It doesn't show up in light. All Aviarians have different bioluminescent patterns, but obviously twins and doppelgangers are an exception. Aviarians have the ability to purr when they're happy or comfortable enough. When Aviarians are angered, overwhelmed, or flustered, all of their feathers puff up and spread out, making them look bigger. Aviarians are able to jump double their height, and have very powerful wings to launch them further. They actually have 2 sets of shoulder blades, the "human" scapulae are also much smaller to accommodate the size of the wings, the avian scapulae(and the rest of the wing shoulder parts) stay between the primary shoulder blades. Continuing on the path of bone structure, the tail needs bones. Since they need the tailbone the same way humans do in order to sit properly, they evolved to have vertebrae-like extensions on the pelvis so that their tails could function. Aviarians do have to preen their feathers and clean them. Preening has the same effect on the body as when, for example, someone plays with your hair, gives you a massage, cuddling. etc. It's relaxing, lowers blood pressure, and results in a better attitude in general. Preening also builds up trust in relationships, whether with parents, siblings, other relatives or spouses. Aviarians are omnivorous, but they mostly avoid eating anything that comes from birds, excluding birds of prey such as vultures, eagles, hawks, etc. They would probably feel pretty uncomfortable in a place like KFC because of this. Like most living entities with feathers, Aviarians molt their feathers once a year. Aviarian children are referred to as Winglets, teen Aviarians would likely be Fledglings and adult Aviarians are just Aviarians. Aviarian feather development throughout childhood works the same as birds, they start off with no feathers, then they eventually grow fluffy feathers that could only be used for warmth, and then eventually, as they become teenagers, their normal feathers develop. Most Aviarians are able to fly by the age of 14.

(i accidentally made this one look miserable lol) SO. im pretty sure i can figure out a plot for this, as well as a language, probably. also biology and stuff like that. heck ton of new species too.

#wheatley #portal 2 #portal 2 au

[macwantspeace]

* Today I Learned * I went for a walk down by Wonder Parkway and saw a bright bird in the top of a tree. Most unusual to see a yellow bird here in San Antonio. We have hordes of grackles and aerial circuses of pigeons. Even a few turkey vultures and sparrows. I needed to do a giggle search for “birds that look like cardinals”. Has that puff of pillow hair, and the dark mask by the eye. Birds & Blooms website says Cedar Waxwing.

#city view #birds

[strongermonster]

there's some bluejays fighting with some grackles outside and i'm sitting here watching them Puff before Scream. i love that birds need to expand to talk. charging up the vocalizations

#jj stuff #i crumbled up some stale crackers and fruits and spread them along the railing but We Are Still Fighting. why

[mariposawolf]

Aight, imma hyperfixate on great-tailed grackles, which are my favorite type of birds!

They're extremely common where I live and I used to think they were crows my entire life. But nah, they're grackles and make hella pretty noises!

The females are a "plain and Jane" brown but are still absolute queens. Look at this girl and her big feathers! She's beautiful and she knows it!!

Now the males! They got that shimmery oil-spill look goin for them!! The colors are especially beautiful when they're chillin in the sunlight.

And when they sing, they puff up like a Ghibli character! This guy looks wild af, but he singin his heart out 💖

A thing I always noticed was that they usually gather in swarms at parking lots in the evenings. They'll chill any time of day, but that's when there's the most birds around. And I have a high tendency to stand where I am, close my eyes, and give them a listen.

Despite how beautiful they look and sound, a lot of people I know refer to them as pests or annoying. Like they're a large city's equivalent to a pigeon. But??? They're so freakin gorgeous????

I don't know why they're invading my brain rn, but I just have a great appreciation for these birds❤️

#great tailed grackles #birds #grackle appreciation post #i should be focusing on my final for tomorrow #but here we are lmao #Youtube

[sweetwhumpandhellacomf]

Grackle has nightmares a lot. They’ve gotten less frequent, since moving into the apartment with Willow and finding Lucky, but they’ve gotten no less awful.

He’s cold, he’s in the dark and the light is only visible through thick iron bars. His breath emerges in puffs of mist, as if the cold is leeching his life away.

Grackle reaches out blindly, still asleep, grabbing for the nearest warm thing--Willow. He wraps shaking fingers around his sweetheart’s arm.

Cold, so cold, so cold. He won’t be warm again, will he? He won’t ever see the sun again, will he? Just cold and darkness.

Grackle lets out a tight, shuddery gasp, bowing his head forward and pressing into Willow’s shoulder. Willow’s being dragged to wakefulness by this point, the grip on his arm painful.

He’s cold and he’s scared and he’s alone and he’s cold and

“--kle? Grackle?” He jolts awake, pulling his hands off Willow’s arm and holding them close to his chest. He sits, the covers falling away, eyes darting around the bedroom.

Nightmare. Just a nightmare. Just, just...

The touch of Willow’s warm hand on his fingers that still seem to be frozen makes him jump. He looks over, sees his sweetheart looking up at him. “Bad dream?” He nods miserably, and without being asked, he curls himself down, pressing himself into Willow’s soft, warm embrace. His last few shivers, from fear or from imagined cold, he doesn’t know which, slowly subside.

Grackle’s warm, and he’s safe at home, and the boy he loves is holding him. The nightmare slowly fades, and the two of them curl back up under the covers.

#my writing #whump #willow and grackle

[solarpillar]

where are the grackles today

how do I lure grackles into my backyard

how do I make them do the puff thing

#solar random

[myjourneybacktofitness-blog]

Mixing It Up When I was young, I used to spend lots of time at my Nanny’s house. She was my Mom’s Mom.  The milieu growing up in my home was that of a small cape with 3 siblings all of close age.  Dad was basically absent and Mom worked full time so we could enjoy the quintessential “normal middle class up-bringing”.   My sister and two brothers pretty much brought up ourselves, making our own rules, breaking them, fighting, existing.  I remember things like playing tennis in the street with my sister.  Every time a car encroached we would move aside and when gone, return to the back and forth volley, with our bare feet, blackened and scuffed by hours of non-competitive play. The summers were always warm.  We visited Pine Lake regularly to see Grandma (Dad’s Mom), Aunt Angie, Uncle Frank and a host of other relatives who found solace in the warmth of family Italian hospitality. Dips in the cold lake water revived the spirit. Walks on the freshly oiled dirt road marred our feet with grease and I still wonder today about the toxic effects.  Salamander races on the beach. Stories of bear sightings. Riding the roller coaster and playing the arcade at the mini amusement park.   My favorite times there though were going creek walking.  I swore that was my favorite thing to do in the world at the time. Funny, how did I get to  talking about walking through the cold mountain water in bare feet in crystal clear streams when I was about to discuss (at least that's where I was headed when I started this chapter) mixing substances in the bathroom at my Nan’s? I think because life really is all a mix.  There’s so much intertwined in our lives and it blurs the complete picture of who we are.  We are melded into the now from all our past experiences. All that we are comes from all that we were.  So back to Nan’s.  In stark contrast to how I lived at home which was a chaotic, electric and dysfunctional existence; my Nanny and Doc lived in a neat and tidy well organized ranch house with a redwood fence around back. Out in the back corner a 4 foot by 3 foot sandbox with a long seat on each short side sat with shovels and small bowls and buckets. Five majestic full grown willow trees bordered the yard. Climbing them was fun though you wouldn’t get far due to their massiveness. I remember the Japanese beetles would fall off and cling to my finger like a baby that hung to its mom for dear life.   Nanny had a clothesline out the back door for hanging extras like the bathroom rug or some towels.  It was the square type on a pole stuck to a hole in the ground.   There was also a bird feeder out back.  We would lay out dried bread crumbs for the birds and watch out the window for cardinals and bluebirds and grackles. I still have and use to this day the National Geographic Book of Birds that we used to look up birds we would see that were new and interesting. Being in the house was calm, it was quiet and peaceful.  It was clean and organized but not stuffy.  The life my Nanny and Doc breathed into that space made it a home and made it comfortable. We would have cubed steak, potato, green beans and rolls for dinner with cold milk in the old monogrammed sterling silver children’s cups that were used by their own three children when they were young. After dinner Nanny would do the dishes then set the table for the morning coffee with the cups turned upside down on their saucers. The portable radio sitting on the table that played “the oldies and the news of the day once in the evening would be silent.   Lights out in the kitchen and now into the living room to chat, read or play. The days at Nan’s were always the same. They were predictable. They were warm. In the evening after dinner I would usually get a bath.  I relaxed in a luxurious warm and bubbly mix with small hard plastic, primary colored, different shaped boats, old dish detergent bottles and some small metal jello molds.  The pink tub with brown and pink tiled walls and a full glass door enclosure kept the heat and the steam in.  Any dirt from my day of play and sunshine melted off leaving me glistening clean.  When done bathing, I would step into onto the soft bath mat, the room emanating warmth from the little space heater set near the door.   The after bath ritual was always the same.  First, a splattering of Jean Nate after bath splash, Jergens lotion, then the powder puff!  Why am I still not doing this?! Comb and dry the hair with the old green hand held hair dryer with the red hot coils was next.  Finally, I got my pick of 2 nighties hanging in the spare room closet.  The one I picked most was an off white long sleeved nightie with light blue piping details and a matching blue sleeveless robe with white piping.  The topper was the knitted pink slippers that Nanny kept in the top drawer.   Then, into bed.  A row of children’s books awaited in the bookshelf headboard.  I would read til I fell asleep with the faint din of the nightlight and familiar shadows of my Nan’s oil paintings that hung on the walls. I was always comfortable there. Always at peace. So back to the whole point of this story.  Mixing things up.... I would go to my Nan’s and sometimes I would go into the bathroom just to experiment.  Nan always had a stack of small dixie cups next to the sink for rinsing or grabbing a sip of water.  I liked to use them for mixing.  I would take one of those cups and pour some of the powder puff powder in, then mix a little lotion and some jean nate and maybe a touch of water.  Usually I would make some type of paste.  And that’s about it.  I just liked to see what would happen with different mixtures, textures, smells, color combos. When I was done I would hide the dixie cup with my creation under the sink. Later, when I was in my teens I admitted to my Nan that I used to do this and she laughed saying she always wondered what all these cups full of “whateverthatis” was.  And all this brings me to today and the now.  I still enjoy mixing and creating but now its usually with food.  The other day I was making a healthy smoothie.  There were small piles of ingredients ready to throw in and mix and create some concoction. Maybe that's what life’s all about.  Mixing it up...… Suzes Power Packed Mix it Up Lunch 2 scoops protein powder 1 scoop beneficial fiber 1 tbsp. Matcha powder 1 scoop power greens 1 tsp chia seeds a huge handful spinach leaves 1/2 banana 1/4 c raspberries a little ice blend it up eat it :)  (not to be left under the sink)

[seniorbrief]

The Strangest Animal Found in Each State

California: Banana slug

IRC/Shutterstock

The sex life of these gooey, yellow mollusks is even more bizarre than their coloring or the fact that they inch down from high tree branches on thin strands of slime in much the same way as spiders utilize their webbing. For starters, according to a 1916 paper by Stanford University zoology professor Harold Heath, they are hermaphrodites. Two, a slug penis, which emerges from its head, can be as long as its entire body. That makes for some of the largest male genitalia of any species in proportion to its overall size. Three, reproductive sessions last hours and sometimes end in apophallation, which is when a banana slug gnaws off and eats its partner’s privates. They do not grow back.

Colorado: Sage grouse

Kerry Hargrove/Shutterstock

Although the low fast fliers have poor eyesight themselves, they are quite the spectacle to watch during the spring breeding season. Defenders of Wildlife explains that males develop white chest feathers and specialized head plumage and that is just the beginning of their fascinating mating ritual. At dawn or dusk, birds in the mood for love assemble on leks—ancestral strutting grounds returned to annually that can be as far as 50 miles from their winter habitats—and strut, fan tail feathers, and puff their chests until bright yellow air sacs are revealed and hens are smitten. Don’t miss these 20 stunningly beautiful photos of birds.

Connecticut: Star-nosed mole

Agnieszka Bacal/Shutterstock

Star-nosed moles, according to National Geographic, eat faster than any other mammal on Earth. They decide if something is edible in 8 milliseconds and devour their meal (mostly bugs) in less than two-tenths of a second. They owe part of their ability to the extremely efficient operation of their nervous system and partly to their hideous “noses.” The star, which contains 100,000 nerve fibers contained into a space smaller than your fingertip, is the most sensitive touch organ in any mammal. They are also the only mammal known to smell underwater and again they have their grotesque snouts to thank. Moles blow bubbles into the water and then re-inhale them to catch a whiff of potential prey. Check out the amazing abilities and adaptations of 10 other species.

Deleware: Common grackle

Glass and Nature/Shutterstock

These birds may be labeled “common,” but their foraging techniques are anything but. Grackles follow plows to catch invertebrates and mice, snatch leeches from the legs of turtles, raid nests and steal worms from other birds, wade in shallow water to fish, and use the hard keel on the inside of their upper mandible to saw open acorns. They also practice the strange habit of anting, in which they get low to the ground, wings spread, and let ants crawl all over them. It is postulated that the formic acid deposited by the insects gets rid of parasites. When they can’t find ants, grackles have been known to use walnut juice, marigolds, lemons, limes, and mothballs to achieve the same results. Check out these other smart and resourceful animals.

Original Source -> The Strangest Animal Found in Each State

source https://www.seniorbrief.com/the-strangest-animal-found-in-each-state/

#seniorbrief #seniors

[ostdrossel]

March is well on its way

into spring, and it is noticeable when you step outside right away. The Redwinged Blackbirds and Grackles have even started to puff up already, and it is glorious to listen to and watch. The Titmice have also become a lot more vocal, and the Goldfinches are turning more and more yellow, changing into summer feathers. It is just so lovely to see the changes.

#birds #backyard birds #signs of spring #Redwinged Blackbird #black red yellow #American Goldfinch #Tufted Titmouse #sounds of spring #birds of Michigan #birds of north america #birdwatching #birdlovers #nature #Ostdrossel #birdphotography

[ostdrossel]

The extreme heat

of the last two days has been rough on everybody, including the garden. The bird bath was visited frequently, and during the hottest hours, everybody was looking for shade or ways to stay cool. Some take sunbaths, looking like they have a seizure, others puff up. Apart from the Grackles, the MoDos are my favorite puffer uppers. They always seem very self-confident, and this one is no exception.

#birds #backyard birds #Mourning Dove #MoDo #borb #puffball #confidence #hot summer #birds of Michigan #birds of north america #birdwatching #birdlovers #nature #Ostdrossel #gif #birdphotography