Bird feeding at Yelagin park and saying 'Farewell!' to winter

This post goes for 'Show me a photo (of a bird)' contest, round #209. Week had no specific topic given, so I decided to share some very fresh photos I made last week, on a walk at Central St.Petersburg's park at Yelagin Island. This time I brought home no fascinating pictures, but had a few nice encounters, including two exceptional ones!. 😎

Everything is pretty much frozen here and covered with ice and snow, still hard for birds to find food on their own, till all the nature did not awaken yet. So, feeding the birds still is quite urgent.

The park has a lot of bird feeders. Some of them look like very 'PRO' - I mean not self-made, but definitely marked with some designers hands touch.

This 3-story palace with an attic was the highlight of what we saw.

I did several takes, and this one - with the dove coming in for a landing - seemed to me the most successful. A real "happy click", a frozen moment in time.

And these very characteristic feeders - probably, we can say "Yelagin Park trademark" - in the photographs may look ordinary, but in reality they are very large and massive structures; they do not swing either from the wind or from the landing of birds, effectively protect the covered feed from snow, and most importantly, they are very convenient.

Tits. They were the birds we noticed most often.
If I got it correctly, there were two varieties:
The Great Tit (photo on the right) is the largest of all five tit species that can be found in my area, also most common one. The Blue Tit (left photo) is smaller in size, and its main distinguishing feature is the color of its cap: not black but soft blue, azure - which is why it got its name.

I am very passionate about finding and identification of the other three tit species.
Hopefully one fine day this will happen!

We prepared well for the encounter, and had a large stock of sunflower seeds, excellent treat which tits prefer, and which is especially useful for them in wintertime. Alas! Nothing came of it either for me and my wife, or for this couple, who tried to get to know the shy little birds better at the same time.

But enough of tits. Let's move on to the next item on the program! We met ravens. A pair of ravens were kept in an enclosure, or rather two adjacent enclosures separated by a fence.

The net did not allow us to photograph what was happening, but in the meantime, we were in the right place at the right time, and saw a real love dance: one raven ruffled the feathers on its head, croaked something special, both of them synchronously jumped along the net dividing them, touching their heads, it all looked incredibly touching and tender...

Photographs do not convey the spectacle that we saw. We were pretty fascinated to see it, but again - this was not the highlight of the day!

...We did a big circle around the park central area and turned backwards, when this finally happened. It happened!!! Tadaaaaaam.

In the same bush where half an hour earlier we had lured and (unsuccessfully) fed titmice, I was the first to notice an intriguing and attractive red spot. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!! it was him: a bullfinch! You just don’t know how long I’ve dreamed of seeing this (not the rarest) bird in person. By the way, my wife can boast that last winter she noticed a bullfinch flying into our yard for reconnaissance... but of course, I was in the office at the time. My opportunities to observe birds, especially in winter, are extremely limited. (Consider that I have now moved the fingers of my palm and depicted the dimensions of a matchbox).

I simply squealed with delight and quickly rushed to get closer. The 150mm telephoto lens I was armed with is still catastrophically small for photographing birds from afar...

_{(Cropped close-up of photo above)}

The bullfinch did not appreciate my impulse, made a couple of runs on a parallel course - and disappeared into the thicket of bushes, leaving me without photos, but excited and with a pleasant aftertaste, a feeling of magic that had just happened before my eyes. I AM CONVINCED WITH MY OWN EYES - that bullfinches exist in reality! and not only on holiday cards (lol), where artists love to draw them so much...

Yes, I understand that bird encounters are a direct derivative, a consequence of the amount of time spent searching. If you spend not 2 hours in the park for two weeks, but 4-6 hours every day, then I too could boast of something more...

RUSSIAN VERSION

А теперь окончание этой истории. В том же кустарнике, где получасом раньше мы подманивали и (безуспешно) кормили синиц, я первым заметил интригующее и притягательное красное пятно. АААААААААААА!!!!!! это был он: снегирь! Вы просто не знаете, как давно я мечтал увидеть вживую эту (не самую редкую) птичку. Думаю что я не видел снегирей последние 15-20 лет, если не больше.... я просто не помню, когда видел его в последний раз. Кстати, моя жена похвасталась, что прошлой зимой один снегирь прилетал на разведку во двор нашего дома, и каким-то чудом она его заметила. Повезло... а я в это время разумеется находился в офисе. Мои возможности наблюдать птиц, особенно зимой, крайне ограничены (считайте, что с этими словами я сдвинул пальцы и изобразил размеры спичечного коробка).

Я просто заверещал от восторга, и стремительно бросился подойти поближе. Макро-телевик 150мм, которым я был вооружен, все-таки катастрофически мал для фотографирования птиц издалека. Снегирь увы не оценил моего порыва, сделал пару перебежек параллельным курсом - и был таков, исчез в гуще кустов, оставив меня без ожидаемых фото, но в возбуждении и с мега приятным послевкусием, ощущением случившейся только что на моих глазах магии. Я УБЕДИЛСЯ СВОИМИ ГЛАЗАМИ - что снегири существуют в реальности! а не только на праздничных открытках (лол), где их так любят рисовать художники.

Да, я понимаю что птичьи встречи это прямая производная, следствие от количества времени проведенного в поиске. Если проводить в парке не 2 часа за две недели, а 4-6 часов каждый день, то я тоже мог бы похвастаться чем-то большим... На этом позвольте мне попрощаться; до следующего раза! Пожелайте мне удачи и больше таких сюрпризных встреч.

All images taken by me, copyright (c) @qwerrie

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