Write a story.

Wildlife observations will show how the behavior of wintering birds has changed with the approach of spring. . However, the arrival of rooks is considered the main sign of the onset of spring. In March, wintering birds change their behavior to a more noticeable one: long-tailed tits bask in the sun for a long time and new spring notes appear in their singing. With the approach of spring, birds begin to prepare for the nesting period, so new “songs” can be heard even from wintering jays and magpies. and vanity. Wintering birds and newcomers are actively looking for a place to nest. With the approach of spring, the birds begin the mating period - the bird chirping is heard louder and more cheerfully. In the evenings, wintering birds gather in flocks (it is still cold at night). The evening air is filled with bird din and chirping, and during the day, on the forest edges, the coming spring has prepared natural bird feeders - thawed patches for birds. Spring bad weather and temporary returns of cold weather return birds to winter. Their behavior changes: they again reach for the human dwelling - they fly in small flocks from tree to tree and spring songs are not heard in their twitter. By the end of April, most wintering birds have already laid eggs in their nests. By observing nature, you can see the first news of the approach of spring even by how the behavior of birds wintering in our area changes.

Bridal Nest - Hatching Molting Nomadic Wintering

behavior structure of chicks

The annual life cycle of most birds begins in spring, with their breeding season.. At the beginning of the breeding season, males and females form pairs: small and medium-sized birds pair once per breeding season (sparrows, swallows, etc.), large birds (storks, swans) - for many years or forever. Some birds (black grouse) may not create pairs, but gather in certain places - "currents", where males arrange original tournaments, choosing a female for themselves. They demonstrate complex behaviors. Females give preference to the winners of tournaments. After breeding, the males leave their worries, leaving the females to raise the chicks.

But still, most birds, connecting in pairs for a long period, begin to look for territories for building a nest and begin to build it.

Choice of nesting territory

The arrival of birds in the nesting area is influenced by various factors. The most important ones are:

availability of forage,

breeding success,

habitat stability,

bird age,

bird experience.

Males are engaged in this, having found a place for a nest, they sing.

Each bird species has its own mating song. There are excellent singers among small birds, for example nightingales. In the song of the nightingale, various “knees” are distinguished, among which a click is distinguished, turning into a rolling “rrrr ...”. In alarm, he emits a short whistle - tsikane. Beautiful singer of the spring forest finch, whose short song is loud, cheerful, ending with the sound - "vichiu!" amazing song song thrush. It resembles the words: “Fill-lin, fill-lin, come, come, drink tea, drink tea!” The melancholy, "ku-ku, ku-ku" resounding through the forest is nothing but the song of a male cuckoo, counting on a meeting with a female. The male lowers his wings, lifts up his slightly parted tail, bends down and, inflating his throat, repeats and repeats his call. Finally they heard him. There is a trill sound “cli-cli-cli”, this is a female.

Sexual relations in the vast majority of bird species take the form of monogamy - the formation of mating pairs. Pairing in birds is accompanied by a peculiar behavior - mating games, or mating. At this time, one can observe various methods of courtship of males for females: singing, playing in the air, adopting peculiar poses, deploying plumage, making peculiar sounds, and in some birds, fights between males. The current male is more visible to enemies and at the same time less sensitive and cautious. Consequently, his life at this time is in great danger.

The singing of birds can only be compared with the spring flowering of plants. Flowers amaze with countless shades of colors, birds - with a variety of sounds made. Mostly males sing, much less often - females. Singing females can be observed in bullfinches, flycatchers. Almost all birds sing in spring. For some, the song consists of squeaky cries, for others it consists of melodic trills. However, the biological meaning of these songs (sounds) is the same. First of all, this is a means by which birds warn individuals of their own species that the nesting site they have chosen is occupied, and it is also a loud spring signal of a male calling for a female. The more active the male is, the more chances he has to attract her. Some birds may sing a duet (male and female) at their nest. For fish owls and cranes, who have been living in pairs for many years, the duet song undoubtedly unites them, helps to get used to each other and maintain the constancy of the pair.

During the entire period of nest building and incubation of eggs (May-June), males sing songs near the nest. Then the singing weakens and stops. In general, sound signaling in birds reaches a great variety and perfection, especially in songbirds.

nesting period - a very responsible time in the life of birds. After mating, the birds (males alone or together with the female) begin to build their nests. Cuckoos do not build their nests by throwing eggs into other people's nests, guillemots - they lay their eggs on the ledges of the "bird markets" rocks - and penguins that hatch on the ice of Antarctica. The design of nests and their location in different birds are different.

In the nest, birds lay eggs from 1-2 (black vulture, golden eagle), up to 14 (great tit) and up to 26 pieces (gray partridge). After hatching the chicks and their development during the summer period, the birds begin to prepare for the next period - for wintering.

Having broken into pairs, the birds arrange nests, mating pairs are formed in birds for very different times. Most species are characterized by strict monogamy, when a marriage is for several years, sometimes for life, but more often during the breeding season. Sometimes a change of partner occurs even in the middle of the nesting season between the first and second clutches. Most often this is caused by external factors, and not by the personal dislike of the birds. Thus, under conditions of intense competition with starlings and swifts, the brownie obei is forced to change its nesting place after the appearance of the first brood. Starlings throw sparrows out of the nest, often with eggs and chicks. As a result, these pairs break up and new ones are created.

The main marriage unions are concluded not in the spring, but in the fall - during the winter. In spring, pairs are formed only by young birds from late broods of the previous year and individuals that have lost a partner. Swans, herons, storks, cranes, large predators create pairs for life; for one season - geese; before incubation of eggs - ducks, pheasants. Do not create pairs - black grouse, capercaillie, cuckoo, hummingbird. The white-tailed sandpiper has open free nesting. The female mates with two males and lays eggs in nests at intervals of 2-4 days. The first clutch is incubated by the first male, and the second - not by the second male, but by the female.

According to the nature of the placement of nests, according to their distance from each other, birds are divided into two groups: colonial And single . The colonial type of nesting has certain advantages over the solitary one, mainly for protection from predators. In this case, there is usually no sharp competition for nesting sites. Solitary nesting birds have clearly defined individual areas on which they place nests and from which they collect food for themselves and their chicks. Nesting areas of different pairs are to some extent delimited from each other and in a number of species they are protected by their hosts from invasion by other individuals of their own species, and sometimes from individuals of other, biologically close species.

Bird nests are varied. The nature of the nest is determined by the biological characteristics of the species and depends on the ecological situation in the nesting areas.

There are nests:

simple, bowl-shaped from twigs, branches (rooks, storks); hemispherical, covered with moss on the outside (finches, goldfinches); spherical, covered with moss, stalks (remez, wren); hollows (woodpeckers, thrushes); burrows (shore swallow); nests on the ground (ducks, cranes); nests from clay soil (swifts); do not build nests of hummingbirds, penguins.

The building material for building nests is also diverse. These are grass, branches, sticks, raw clay, feathers, manure and much more. For example, sparrows roll bricks of 3-5 g each from clay, then raise them to trees - it takes 1.5-2.0 thousand bricks to build one house, and it weighs 4-7 kg; build it in 10-16 days. Dressmaker birds bend one or several rows of growing leaves, pierce their edges and sew the leaves inside, insulate with cotton, down and wool. They settle on the verandas of residential buildings and sew their nests from indoor plants. Weavers living in the savannas settle in large colonies and weave up to a hundred nests on a single baobab or acacia. The Remez tit lives in the south of our country. She builds a warm nest of sheep's wool, usually on willow branches above water. In Eastern Europe, remez nests are collected and made into warm slippers. The largest nests are built by weed chickens living in Australia, in the Philippine Islands. They rake leaves, sticks and earth into large piles, 2 m high, 50 m across; they weigh up to 5 tons.

Types of nests	Where is located	The form	Material
Ground: warblers	Among the grass with dry leaves	nesting fossa	Feathers, dry blades of grass
lark	In the middle of the meadow, on the edge	Shara or hut with side entrance nesting fossa	Dry blades of grass
Low above ground: Warbler	At a height of up to 1 m,	Open, small tray, diameter - 50mm.	Dry roots, stems, horsehair
Magpie	In dense thickets	Bulky, height 60cm, rough, closed	Outside, dry branches, in the walls, earth, clay.
In the middle and upper crown parts: Rook	Cultural landscape - park	Massive-rookery
Crow	The top of a tree growing near the river, swamp	bulky	Rough boughs, dry grass mixed with earth. Tray made of wool, hair.
Stork	In a visible, sunny place - a broken top of a tree, on poles	Huge, diameter 1.5 m, completed every year	Branches lined with rags, rags, paper, wool

Due to the climatic conditions of a seasonal nature, some birds find themselves in different weather conditions during the year and, depending on the level of their organization, they tolerate them differently.

v Birds living in the same territory all year round are called settled(house sparrow, magpie, gray partridge, etc.). Their annual cycle consists of two periods: nesting(and related oviposition, incubation, etc.) and wintering. Sedentary birds find their food in one area throughout the year.

v wandering birds(jackdaws, bullfinches, jays, woodpeckers, tits) move in winter in search of food in neighboring areas.

v Migratory birds(white stork, gray crane, blackbirds, swallows, cuckoos) make long migrations, the range of which can be different. For example, barn swallows from Europe fly to southern Africa (distant migrant), rooks winter in the Mediterranean (near migrant). Flights of birds are associated with impending starvation, and the changes occurring in nature (shortening of daylight hours, lowering of temperature, etc.), as well as changes in the physiological state of birds, serve as signals for its onset.

Flights are fraught with difficulties, often with dangers. In difficult routes, many birds die. During migration, the birds adhere to permanent routes, but by which they fly every year for wintering, and in the spring they return back to hatch their chicks. From year to year, from generation to generation, those birds that endure flights better, fly off and arrive on time, survive. The death of those unfit for flight contributed to the development of instincts associated with flights. The instinct of flights is unconscious actions. The "blindness" of instinct is found in the so-called paradoxical flyways. For example, birds that previously lived only in Eastern Siberia and the Far East and wintered in China later gradually settled across Siberia to the west and further to Europe, some to Scandinavia, others to the Dnieper basin, etc. Now these birds in autumn first they fly to the east, that is, to the homeland of their ancestors, and only from there to the south, to China (in the spring - in the opposite direction).

The nature of the flights is different: some birds (small birds) fly in a disorderly group, others, especially large birds, fly in formation (cranes, geese). Flight altitude from 1000 m (for small birds) to 5000 m. The duration of the flight is also different: from 40 km to 1000 km or more per day.

Bird migrations, time, direction, flight speed are studied scientists ornithologists using banding, visual observations, phenological observations.

Homework

1. Learn the abstract.

2. Run a test.

1. Which birds correspond to the listed signs.

2. Which birds correspond to the listed signs.

"Observation of the behavior of birds in autumn"

Pedagogical goal: Continue to form a generalized idea of ​​wintering and migratory birds; learn to distinguish birds by the way they feed; cultivate love for birds, a desire to help them in the cold season; exercise in the correct use of adverbs and tense; develop dexterity, speed of reactions; the ability to act on a signal.

Education targets me: shows interest in birds, features of their life; distinguishes birds by their appearance; pronounces words and sounds correctly; initiative in conversation; capable of targeted observation of objects; shows interest in job assignments; creativity in independent play and motor activity.

Mastered educational areas :

Socio-communicative development”;

"Cognitive development";

"Speech development";

"Artistic and aesthetic development";

"Physical development".

Types of children's activities : game, motor, communicative, labor, cognitive.

Means of implementation : sport equipment; attributes for games; rakes.

Organizational structure of the walk

1. Observation of the behavior of birds.

Birds fly south

Geese, rooks, cranes.

Here is the last flock

Wings flapping in the distance.

M. Evensen

Conversation with children

Draw the children's attention to the fact that the birds are getting smaller and smaller. Note which birds are more common and which are not visible at all. Name migratory and wintering birds, tell about the reasons for their departure. Continuing the story about the birds, explain that in the evening the voices of the birds are getting quieter and quieter, because they are getting ready for bed (some find secluded places to spend the night, others hide in nests or on tree branches).

Questions

How the life of birds has changed with the advent of autumn ? (There is less and less food for birds, it starts to get colder - the birds gather in flocks, try their hand and train the chicks, prepare them for departure)

Tell us about your observations of the behavior of birds in summer and autumn. In summer, there is enough food for the birds, they hatch and feed the chicks. In autumn, birds gather in flocks and fly away to warmer climes.

What happens to bird food in autumn? Feed for birds is becoming less and less: first insects disappear, then plants wither, the number of fruits and seeds decreases.

What is the reason for the departure of insectivorous and granivorous birds in autumn? Insectivores fly away earlier. Since insects disappear, and the birds have nothing to eat. Then the granivores fly away. Birds that eat fruits, seeds, grains.

Why are there fewer birds in autumn? From the end of August, birds begin to fly south, as it gets colder, and insects begin to disappear.

How do birds prepare for departure? Having gathered in flocks, they rapidly rush in the air, exercising before a long-distance flight.

What is the first sign of the approaching autumn migration of birds? The hubbub of birds intensifies, they gather in flocks.

Which birds are the last to fly south? Ducks, geese are waterfowl, they are the last to fly away, until the reservoirs are frozen, they have something to eat.

Do you know how birds line up when they fly south? Cranes fly in a wedge - an angle. Herons and geese - in a row. Ducks line up (one after another.) Some flocks of ducks fly in a gentle arc, and small ones - insectivorous birds - fly in a crowded flock.

Invite the children to get together for a “flight”; form a wedge, a straight line, etc.

Tell about the departure of cranes in the fall. They fly at an angle, in two rows diverging back, with long outstretched necks, loudly cooing. Sometimes it is possible to see how the leading crane - the leader - changes places with its neighbor. One of them will fly under the other and take his place.

Cranes fly, chirp.

Send the last goodbye

Behind them they call summer

Taken to a warm land

Research activity.

Invite the children to consider cards - diagrams that show: an angle, a straight line, a jamb, chaotically, crowded birds. Give an answer to which type of bird each card belongs to.

Labor activity

Collection of seeds of various plants for feeding birds in winter.

Target : to cultivate sympathy, empathy towards birds.

Game activity

Didactic game "Earth, Water, Fire"

Game progress:

Children stand in a circle, in the middle - the leader. He throws the ball to one of the players, while saying one of four words: earth, water, fire, air. If the host says "land", the one who caught must quickly name the one who lives in this environment. On the word "fire" - discard. The one who makes a mistake is out of the game.

Outdoor games

"Swan geese"

Target: Exercise in running with dodging, in catching. Strengthen the ability to perform the actions of the role taken on. Coordinate words with game actions. To develop in children dexterity, ingenuity, speed of reaction. Cultivate purposefulness, a positive emotional attitude.

"Entertainers"

Target: To teach children to coordinate their actions with the actions of their comrades, to develop resourcefulness, imagination.

Outdoor games for children.

Independent games for children.

Nina Alexandrovna Volkova
Birdwatching in winter on a walk with older preschool children

Volkova N.A. Birdwatching on a walk.

"Forest guests" (November December).

1. Research "Titmouse" - a story about tits.

3. Observation "Forest guests" - introduce the concept of nomadic birds.

4. Research “Who came to visit us?” - a story about snowmen.

5. Target walk around the site of the kindergarten "Bird feeders".

6. Study "How do birds behave near the feeder?" - a story about waxwings

7. Observation "Bird's Dining Room".

"Wintering Birds" (January).

8. Observation "Birds in winter" - introduce the concept of wintering birds.

9. Study "Why are birds constantly on the move in winter?"

10. Target walk in the square (park) "Behavior of birds in winter"

11. Study "What do birds do in the evening?"

12. Study "How do birds behave on frosty days?"

13. Observation "Wintering Birds".

"Forest guests"

november 2 weeks

Study of "Tits".

Tasks. Cultivate children's desire to watch birds. Learn to establish causal relationships between natural phenomena and the life of birds. Cultivate a desire to take good care of the birds, feed them in winter.

Research progress.

With a yellow breast, you know the bird,

It's called a tit.

Give me an answer, children

Tits in the city or not?

Mission: Birdwatching. Find out if there are tits among the birds. Is the assignment clear? (children's answers).

At the end of the walk, invite the children to share their observations. Thank the children who noticed something unusual, interesting.

Output. Tits flew (did not fly) to the city.

The teacher's story.

Today I want to tell you about a titmouse. The tit is a beautiful bird: yellow feathers adorn it, the black stripe attracts attention. She got her name for sonorous songs, reminiscent of the chime of a bell: “Zin-zin! Blue blue!"

The titmouse is a curious bird, it is interested in everything, sticks its beak everywhere, does not sit still for a minute. She easily jumps on branches and with the help of sharp and tenacious claws deftly climbs tree trunks.

The tit is a forest bird, cleans the forest from harmful insects, protects plants. In winter, tits gather in flocks, move closer to people. In winter, tits continue a good deed, exterminate harmful insects.

You help the tits in winter, make feeders. Tits prefer fatty food, it protects better from the cold. Put unsalted lard, butter, seeds in the feeder, feed the titmouse in winter.

Conversation-reflection "Why do people celebrate Sinichkin Day"

Tasks. Encourage children's attempts to share a variety of impressions with the teacher and other children, clarify the source of the information received. To consolidate children's ideas about birds. Develop an interest in folk signs. Cultivate the desire to take care of birds in winter.

Conversation.

There is such a proverb "The titmouse bird is not great, but even then it knows its holiday."

November 12 is an ecological holiday - Sinichkin Day. On this day, residents of different cities and villages are preparing to meet the "winter guests" - birds that stay for the winter in our area: tits, goldfinches, bullfinches, waxwings. People prepare food for them, including “titmouse delicacies”: unsalted bacon, unroasted pumpkin, sunflower or peanut seeds - they make and hang feeders.

Why are they doing that? (children's answers)

Why do birds need to be fed in winter? (children's answers)

Why did people call the holiday Sinichkin's day, and not Sparrow's or Pigeon's? (children's answers)

What can we do with you on Titmouse Day?

Bird feeders are hung out at the kindergarten site.

Do you know that prudent tits hide bugs, spiders and midges in the cracks of the bark and forks of trees in reserve. In one day, a titmouse can make about a thousand such burial sites. When the cold comes, the tit will find a bug stored in the summer and peck it. Making stocks, these birds try not only for themselves, but also for other birds. That is why the tits are carefully examined, they constantly search the places where they can expect a treat prepared by someone.

Remember folk signs.

If birds appeared in flocks near the house, it means that frosts are about to break out.

If the tit whistles - be a clear day, if it squeaks - be a night frost.

If a lot of tits are going to the feeders - to a blizzard and snowfall.

Early bird jumping

On the snow-covered branches

yellow-breasted tits

They came to visit us.

"Tin-shadow, tili-shadow,

The winter day is getting shorter

You won't have time to eat

The sun will set behind the fence.

No mosquito, no fly.

Everywhere only snow and snow.

It's good that we have feeders

Made by a kind person!

Yuri Sinitsyn

december 1 week

Observation "Forest guests".

Tasks. Cultivate children's desire to watch birds. Pay attention to the birds that fly from the forest to the city for the winter. To teach children to establish causal relationships between natural phenomena and the life of birds. Cultivate a desire to take good care of the birds, feed them in winter.

Conversation.

(children's answers)

Early bird jumping

On the snow-covered branches

yellow-breasted tits

They came to visit us.

Yuri Sinitsyn

Where did yellow-breasted tits come from? (children's answers)

According to the forest calendar, this is the month of "Winter Guests". Tits, bullfinches, waxwings, woodpeckers fly to us from the winter forest. Why do you think these birds come to our city from the forest? (children's answers)

How can we help forest guests survive the harsh winter? (children's answers)

Here are some funny birds.

yellow-breasted titmouse,

Flying from branch to branch

The seeds were collected. //

Red-breasted bullfinches

From dawn to dawn

Flying in the park

Tree buds pecked. // Jumping in place, flapping your arms (wings).

The whistlers have arrived

They sang a song loudly, Spring with turn to the right and to the left.

Gathered rowan berries

They flew from place to place. // Tilt, straighten up.

The woodpecker came to visit

Sit quietly on a tree

He pounded on the trunk with his beak,

Koroedov drove everyone away. // They hit fist on fist.

The story of the teacher (in the group).

Nuthatch

If suddenly, a gray bird catches your eye, which does not think at all about how to move along a tree and walks up and down the trunk, as if walking on the ground - there is no doubt that this is another forest guest, a nuthatch. The back of the nuthatch is gray-blue, the abdomen is light. A black stripe runs along the sides of the head, from the beak and through the eyes.

But he flew to our city from the coniferous forests of shur. Schur has a gray-crimson plumage, a thick, short, slightly hooked beak. In winter, smurfs, uniting in flocks, roam, descending gradually to the south and adhering to coniferous forests. Schura feed on seeds of coniferous trees, rowan berries.

Goldfinch.

Goldfinch is a very mobile bird. It stands out for its red-black-yellow coloration, it can hardly be confused with any other bird.

In autumn and winter, flocks of carduelis roam from field to field, through abandoned meadows and fields, where they collect seeds of thistles, burdocks and other weeds, or deftly climb the thinnest branches of birch and alder, taking seeds from small cones.

Study "Who came to visit us?"

Tasks. Cultivate children's desire to watch birds. Learn to note the characteristic features of birds. To instill in children a sense of compassion and mercy, a desire to feed the birds in winter.

Research progress.

Place food in bird feeders.

We made feeders

Birdhouses are open.

Who comes to visit us

Does he visit our feeders?

Task: observe the feeders. Find out: what birds fly to our feeders. Is the assignment clear? (children's answers).

Let's remember the rules of bird watching. (children's answers).

Ornithologists start researching.

Output. In winter, it is difficult for birds to find food, so they fly to feeders.

The teacher's story.

I saw a bullfinch today. He has a beautiful black cap on his head. The same color and wings. On the back, the feathers are painted gray, and on the sides of the head and breast are red. Bullfinches come to us with the first frosts from coniferous forests. In autumn, bullfinches gather in flocks, fly together through forests and parks, peck berries of mountain ash, hawthorn and wild rose.

When a snowy frosty winter sets in, bullfinches move closer to human habitation, fly into gardens and orchards, look for rowan, sea buckthorn, and barberry berries. They scatter in the bushes and whistle melodicly: “Rum-rum-rum!” If you are lucky enough to see these beautiful birds, quietly admire them, trying not to scare them away.

Targeted walk around the site of the "Bird Feeders" kindergarten.

Tasks. Remind the children that wintering birds really need people's help. To instill in children a sense of compassion and mercy, a desire to feed the birds in winter. Develop a desire to watch birds.

Place food in bird feeders.

Feed the birds in winter.

Let from all over

They will flock to you, like home,

Stakes on the porch.

Alexander Yashin

Why do birds need to be fed in winter? (children's answers).

What do you think, only you and I hung a bird feeder? (children's answers).

Now we will take a walk with you around the kindergarten and take a closer look at where the bird feeders are hanging? What birds come to the feeders?

Let's remember the rules of bird watching. (children's answers).

During the walk, draw the attention of children to bird feeders, not only in the kindergarten, but also behind the fence (if any). Encourage those children who do not make noise, do not run, but calmly watch the birds.

Why do you think there are so many feeders? (children's answers).

Output. In winter, it is difficult for birds to find food, so they fly to feeders. There are a lot of birds, so you need a lot of feeders.

Fun exercises "Forest guests".

Study "How do birds behave near the feeder?"

Tasks.

Research progress.

Place food in bird feeders.

We made feeders

Birdhouses are open.

Watching the behavior of birds

We learn the nature of the birds.

Task: observe the behavior of birds. Find out: how the birds behave near the feeder. How do they peck the food in the feeder (immediately sit on the feeder or be careful and first sit on the bushes, and only then fly up to the feeder, quarrel or not, are they inferior to each other. Is the task clear? (children's answers).

Let's remember the rules of bird watching. (children's answers).

Ornithologists start researching.

In the group after the walk, invite the children to talk about their observations. If the child does not remember the name of the bird, ask him to describe it. Thank the children who noticed something unusual, interesting.

Output. Birds behave differently on feeders. Sparrows often quarrel, take food from each other. Bullfinches are calm birds. Titmouse love to peck at lard, swinging on a rope, for which lard is attached to the feeder. When a large bird flies up to the feeder - a crow, a magpie or a dove - small birds fly off to the side.

The teacher's story.

Today I saw amazing birds. They were large birds, in elegant plumage, with a tuft on their heads. They whistled softly, as if they were playing pipes: "Sviri-sviri-svir." And these amazing birds are called waxwings. Waxwings love ripe rowan berries. They fly in flocks from one tree to another.

Waxwings.

The waxwings have arrived,

They played the pipes

They whistled: “Sviri-svir!

We'll have a feast in the forest!

Let the leaves fall from the branches

Rustling autumn rain

We peck rowan brush -

You won't find better berries!

Shorygina T. A.

Observation "Bird's Dining Room".

Tasks. Cultivate children's desire to watch birds. Pay attention to the birds that fly from the forest to the city for the winter. Teach children to note the characteristic features of birds. To instill in children a sense of compassion and mercy, a desire to feed the birds in winter.

Conversation.

Look carefully around you, what birds do you see? (children's answers)

We made a feeder

We have opened a canteen...

Visit on the first day of the week

The tits have come to us.

And on Tuesday - bullfinches,

Brighter than the dawn.

3. Alexandrova

And what birds flew into our bird dining room? (children's answers)

According to the forest calendar, this is the month of "Winter Guests". What birds flew to the city from the forest? (children's answers)

Why do you think birds fly from the forest to the city in winter? (children's answers)

How do we help forest guests survive the harsh winter? (children's answers)

It is difficult to find food in the forest, so forest birds move closer to people. They wander from place to place in search of food. Therefore, these birds are called nomadic birds.

Fun exercises "Forest guests".

Invite the children to watch the birds during the walk.

As a group, ask the children to share their observations.

Thank those children who actually watched the birds.

"Wintering Birds"

January 4 weeks

Observation "Birds in winter".

Tasks. To form children's ideas about how cooling and shortening of the day change the life of birds. Cultivate a desire to take care of wintering birds. Develop observation, curiosity, attention.

Conversation.

Look carefully around you, what birds do you see? (children's answers)

... There are different birds:

Some are afraid of blizzards

And fly away for the winter

To the kind, warm south.

Others, those people are different:

In the frost they circle over the forest,

For them, separation from their homeland

More terrible than a fierce cold ...

K. Muhammadi

What are these birds that are not afraid of frost and blizzards? (children's answers)

Sparrows and doves, crows and magpies are wintering birds. They do not fly away for the winter to warm lands, but stay with us for the winter, which is why they are called wintering birds. Forest guests fly into the city from the forest: tits, woodpeckers, and nomadic birds: bullfinches, waxwings.

According to the forest calendar, this is the month of "Severe Hunger". In winter, it is difficult for birds to find food under the snow, which is why severe hunger sets in. Fierce means very strong. Many birds do not survive until spring, they die of hunger.

How do we help birds survive the freezing winter days? (children's answers)

Sparrows and doves

They came to visit, // Running in a circle, wave your arms (wings).

Sad, frowning

They sat on the birch. // sit down, stand up

The paws were raised

Warmed with feathers. //

The grains were looking for

Didn't see anything //

We made feeders

The birds were invited. // They hit fist on fist.

We are glad to winter birds,

We'll give them food. // Imitation, scatter food.

Invite the children to watch the birds during the walk.

As a group, ask the children to share their observations.

Thank those children who actually watched the birds.

The study "Why do birds constantly move in winter?"

Tasks. To form children's ideas about the adaptation of birds to their environment. To expand knowledge about wintering birds, about the behavior of birds in winter. Develop observation, curiosity, attention. Cultivate a desire to take care of wintering birds.

Research progress.

Why do birds jump, fly,

Don't they play games?

Why do they eat so much

Perhaps they want to get fat?

We will unravel the secrets of birds,

We learn something new.

Mission: Birdwatching. Find out why birds are constantly on the move in winter, what they are doing. Is the assignment clear? (children's answers).

Let's remember the rules of bird watching.

Bird watching rules.

Birds are very shy, so you need to be very quiet and not make noise.

You can not run up to the birds, you prevent them from resting or eating.

You can’t throw stones or sticks at birds, they are alive, they hurt.

Ornithologists start researching.

In the group after the walk, invite the children to talk about their observations. Thank the children who noticed something unusual, interesting.

The teacher's story.

Winter is a very difficult time of the year for birds. They are cold and hungry. Because of the cold, birds lose a lot of heat. How can they keep warm? In order to keep warm, birds need to eat a lot, and they need much more food in winter than in summer. “Frost is not terrible for a well-fed one,” people say. Therefore, from early morning until late evening, wintering birds are busy with one important thing - the search for food. The day in winter is short, it gets dark quickly, and food cannot be found in the dark. So they get up at sunrise, and look for food for themselves all day. And whoever did not find food and remained hungry - will disappear at night, freeze! It is easier to find food in the city, so the birds huddle in the cold closer to people, to warmth and food. People make feeders, feed the birds to help the birds survive the winter.

Output. Birds are constantly moving to find food and not freeze. Birds eat a lot, because a well-fed bird will not freeze.

Target walk in the square (park) "Behavior of birds in winter".

Tasks. To form children's ideas about how cooling and shortening of the day change the life of birds. To expand knowledge about wintering birds, about the behavior of birds in winter. Develop observation, curiosity, attention. To instill in children a sense of compassion and mercy.

The walk begins in the courtyard of the kindergarten. Remember the rules of conduct on the target walk.

The purpose of our walk: the behavior of birds in winter. Only the most attentive and observant children will notice birds in winter. Let's remember the rules of bird watching.

In the park, walking along the paths, draw the attention of children to birds. Ask the children to tell what they know about this bird, to complete the story of the children. Encourage those children who do not make noise, do not run, but calmly watch the birds.

Remind the children that wintering birds really need people's help.

Funny exercises "Wintering birds".

In the group after the walk, invite the children to talk about their observations. If the child does not remember the name of the bird, ask him to describe it. Thank the children who noticed something unusual, interesting.

Study "What do birds do in the evening?"

Tasks. To form children's ideas about how cooling and shortening of the day change the life of birds. To expand knowledge about the behavior of birds in winter. Learn to establish causal relationships between the time of day and the life of birds. Develop observation, curiosity, attention.

Research progress.

In the evening the birds are gone!

Perhaps they were stolen by owls?

We will unravel the secrets of birds,

We learn something new.

Mission: Birdwatching. Find out how birds behave in the evening when it is dark outside. Is the assignment clear? (children's answers).

Let's remember the rules of bird watching.

Bird watching rules.

Birds are very shy, so you need to be very quiet and not make noise.

You can not run up to the birds, you prevent them from resting or eating.

You can’t throw stones or sticks at birds, they are alive, they hurt.

Ornithologists start researching.

The next day, in a group, ask the children to share their observations. Thank the children who noticed something unusual, interesting.

Output. In the evening the birds sleep because it is dark outside.

The teacher's story.

At night, the birds sleep. They gather in flocks, hide in hollows, in thick fir-trees, closely press against each other and sleep until the sun rises. The night is especially dangerous for birds, the nights in winter are long and frosty. If a bird goes to bed hungry, it may not wake up in the morning.

The study "How do birds behave on frosty days?"

Tasks. To form children's ideas about how cooling and shortening of the day change the life of birds. To expand knowledge about wintering birds, about the behavior of birds in winter. Develop observation, curiosity, attention. Cultivate a desire to take care of wintering birds.

Research progress.

Why don't wintering birds freeze?

How do you protect yourself from frost?

We will unravel the secrets of birds,

We learn something new.

Mission: Birdwatching. Find out how birds behave on a frosty day. Is the assignment clear? (children's answers).

Let's remember the rules of bird watching.

Bird watching rules.

Birds are very shy, so you need to be very quiet and not make noise.

You can not run up to the birds, you prevent them from resting or eating.

You can’t throw stones or sticks at birds, they are alive, they hurt.

Ornithologists start researching.

In the group after the walk, invite the children to talk about their observations.

Thank the children who noticed something unusual, interesting.

The teacher's story.

Birds change plumage for warmer and denser winter plumage in winter. In frost, birds do not fly, but sit ruffled. When a bird sits, it has still air between its feathers. It does not allow cold to the bird's body and retains heat.

In flight, frosty air rushes to the bird's body from all sides, and the bird freezes on the fly. And even in winter frosts, you can see how the birds stand on one or the other leg. It is they who warm their legs in feathers, lifting them from the cold ground. Wintering birds spend the night in hollows, in dense fir-trees, they closely press against each other and hide their beaks under their wings for warmth.

Output. On frosty days, the birds sit ruffled to keep warm.

Observation "Wintering Birds".

Tasks. Summarize the knowledge of children about wintering birds. To form ideas about how cooling and shortening of the day change the life of birds. Cultivate the desire to take care of the birds. Develop observation, curiosity, attention.

Conversation.

Look carefully around you, what birds do you see? (children's answers)

... Winter sings - calls out,

Shaggy forest cradles

The call of a pine forest.

Around with deep longing

Sailing to a distant land

Gray clouds.

And in the yard a snowstorm

Spreads like a silk carpet,

But it's painfully cold.

Sparrows are playful

Like orphan children

Huddled at the window.

Little birds are chilled,

Hungry, tired

And they huddle tighter.

A blizzard with a furious roar

Knocks on the shutters hung

And getting more and more angry.

Sergey Yesenin

What birds are not afraid of frost and blizzards, but stay with us for the winter? (children's answers)

What are these birds called? (wintering birds)

What have we learned about wintering birds? (children's answers)

In order to survive, birds need a lot of food;

Birds are constantly on the move, looking for food;

In the evening the birds sleep because it is dark outside;

On frosty days, the birds sit ruffled to keep warm.

How do we help birds survive the freezing winter days? (children's answers)

Funny exercises "Wintering birds".

Sparrows and doves

They flew to visit, // B eg in a circle, wave your arms (wings).

Sad, frowning

They sat on the birch. // sit down, stand up

The paws were raised

Warmed with feathers. // stand on one leg

The grains were looking for

Didn't see anything // Tilt, straighten up, shrug.

We made feeders

The birds were invited. // They hit fist on fist.

We are glad to winter birds,

We'll give them food. // Imitation, scatter food.

Invite the children to watch the birds during the walk.

As a group, ask the children to share their observations.

Thank those children who actually watched the birds.

Autumn-winter excursions

The theme of autumn-winter ornithological excursions is quite diverse. Autumn migrations and molting, invasive invasions of birds, daily flights and concentration at roosting and feeding sites, food ration and foraging methods, the winter nature of distribution over the territory, and finally, autumn singing and winter breeding - this is an incomplete list of phenomena and aspects of bird life that can be study in autumn and winter. Among them, the most striking are the autumn migrations of birds. They are even more noticeable than spring ones, since in autumn the birds usually fly more slowly and make long stops more often.

About autumn migrations

When the birds finish their breeding season, they begin to move in search of food. In some species, these movements almost immediately develop into migration. This has been observed in a number of long-distance migrants that leave the breeding area before they even begin to molt. Their autumn molt takes place during the winter. In other species, and these are the majority, there is a pre-migration period between reproduction and migration. It sometimes lasts for several months. During this time, the birds completely or partially change the old plumage for a new one, accumulate fat reserves, after which they begin to fly.

General direction and time of passage. In the European part of the USSR, the general direction of autumn migrations is southwestern. Moving towards their southern European or African wintering grounds, most birds go around large bodies of water and fly, as in spring, adhering to the coastline. This is the behavior of both waterfowl and land birds. Thus, river valleys, as well as coastal zones of lakes and bays again become the main places of concentration. However, it is now necessary to carry out observations mainly on the northern and eastern coasts.

Birds wintering in Southeast Asia and flying eastward are few in our country. As an example, lentils, dubrovnik, green warbler, garden warbler and some others can be named. They start their autumn migration very early - from the end of July. In late August - early September, the last individuals fly off. Such an early date of departure is associated with the large length of their migration routes. It is difficult to notice them on the flight path. They fly at night. The eyes are caught mainly during daytime stops. Knowing the autumn voices of these birds makes it easier to make observations. The lentil makes a whistling "twee", the garden warbler clicks dryly, the bunting-remez is characterized by a high metallic chik, etc.

Of the birds flying to the southwest, whose migration also takes place in August - early September, we will point out various waders: the carrier, phi-fi, chernysh, large snail, medium and large curlews. It is not difficult to notice these birds, since they fly not only at night, but also during daylight hours and accompany their movement with loud specific voices. Swifts and cuckoos, flycatchers, warblers, crickets and yellow wagtails also fly in August. Their timing is very specific. In the Leningrad region, for example, the peak of the first wave of autumn migration, according to the observations of G. A. Noskov, invariably falls on the period from 3 to 10 August. The visible migration flow at this time is dominated by flocks of yellow wagtails. Black swifts annually disappear from Leningrad on August 15-18. Only a few individuals linger until September, sometimes even until October, and once Yu. B. Pukinsky observed several swifts near Leningrad in early November. Such deviations from the norm are also known in other species, but they are rare and their causes are by no means clear in all cases. Moreover, they are of interest and deserve special attention.

September - early October is the most suitable period for excursions, since the flow of visible migration at this time is most pronounced. In September, you can observe the passage of most birds, both land and wetland habitats. During one excursion it is possible to see representatives of 60-70 species. The picture of the flight is especially grandiose in late September - early October, when more than a million individuals of different birds can be found on the northern coast of the Gulf of Finland per day.

The peaks of the passage of individual species, however, do not coincide. In the first ten days of September, willow warblers and sand martins are numerous, flocks of lapwings and pigeons fly, although the last two species continue to migrate later. In the second decade of September near Leningrad there is a massive flight of turukhtans, as well as great snipes. From mid-September, flocks of golden plovers begin to meet. These are nocturnal migrants and they have to be found in places of rest - in coastal meadows and pastures. In the second decade of September, many insectivorous birds fly in mass - barn swallows, forest pipits, gray flycatchers, warblers. Of the small insectivorous birds, the Chiffchaff lingers longer than others in the middle latitudes, whose autumn singing in resting places can be heard until the end of October. On clear, fine days, old male barn swallows also sing on the autumn migration. In the third decade of September, the last swallows fly off, the nightjar migration takes place, and the passage of mixed flocks of finches and finches, buntings, meadow pipits and white wagtails, robins, song thrushes and redwings becomes especially noticeable. Wood pigeons, starlings, siskins, buzzards continue to fly.

In the second half of September - early October, the activity of birds associated with wetlands noticeably increases. At this time, there is the last wave of passage of cranes, which have already united in large flocks. Geese and goose are flying. The number of snipes is increasing in water meadows and stubble fields, and garshneps are appearing. On the shores of the Gulf of Finland, Ladoga, Peipsi and Pskov lakes, as well as Lake Ilmen, migratory flocks of various ducks are visible everywhere: mallards, wigeons, goldeneyes, crested ducks, lutks and others. Black-headed gulls form clusters of thousands of birds resting in shallow waters. Gray and herring gulls are also numerous. Sometimes you can also meet a flown sea gull, which is distinguished by the presence of a black mantle on its back and wings. It is very similar to the chickadee, but larger than it. By this time, Klusha usually finishes the span. The little gull flies off even earlier, without changing its nuptial attire. In mid-October, the last wave of passage is observed, which continues until snow falls. Its peak falls on the end of the second - the beginning of the third decades of October. Precisely by this time, woodcock outbursts become numerous, buzzards appear, field thrushes fly in mass, there is a gross passage of northern divers - sockeye and long-tailed ducks, as well as geese and swans. At the same time, finches, starlings and rooks finish their migration, although some of them remain to winter within the middle zone. The passage of swans, part of dives, gulls, woodcocks and individual harriers are sometimes observed after snowfall, at the end of the first ten days of November. According to the figurative expression of S. A. Buturlin, at this time the birds are already flying "on the wings of a snow blizzard." The departure of the last migrants usually coincides with the appearance of the first flocks of waxwings, tap-dances and snow buntings, the nesting areas of which are located in the more northern regions. At the beginning of November, smurfs also arrive, but they do not appear in large numbers every autumn, but only during the years of the fodder harvest. In this regard, they are referred to the group of so-called invasive birds, which will be discussed below.

When observing the autumn migrations of birds on ornithological excursions, it is necessary to record not only the calendar dates of passage of each species, but also the hours of the day when birds fly most actively. It has long been accepted to distinguish between day and night migrants. During the day, as you know, storks, swans, geese, cranes, predators, pigeons, many passerines - swallows, buntings, finches fly. Warblers, warblers, nightingales, robins, many blackbirds, quails, as well as most waders, shepherds, and river ducks move only at night in autumn. In recent years, however, it has become clear that the division of birds into nocturnal and diurnal migrants is very arbitrary. There is a significant number of species moving during the autumn migration both at night and during the day.

Studying the movements of night migrants is associated with methodological difficulties. At present, they are being studied with the help of radar, and flying birds are also observed through a telescope against the background of the moon's disk or in the beam of a strong searchlight. In the USSR, such studies were carried out by K. V. Bolshakov and S. P. Rezvy. Naturally, counting birds by their voices also helps to identify the species composition of nocturnal migrants flying through the observation post. And despite the use of a whole range of methods for counting birds, there is still much that is not clear in the biology of flights of nocturnal migrants. One of the mysteries is still the mechanism of formation of the so-called rashes.

Outcrops of hunting bird species."Vysypka" is a hunting term. It is applied to temporary accumulations of some birds in places of rest and feeding on autumn migration. Classical rashes form five species of hunting birds: quail, snipe, harrier, great snipe and woodcock. All of these are typical night migrants. They stop for a daytime rest, still dark, in places specific for each species. Quail concentrate in the fields of corn and millet, in weeds and vegetable gardens, and on the Black Sea coast of the Caucasus and Crimea on grassy plateaus, in vineyards and orchards. Snipe rashes usually occur in water meadows and damp stubble fields, the snipe prefers marshy places and mud, the great snipe prefers meadows, fields and vegetable gardens, and the woodcock prefers floodplain alder forests. Depending on weather conditions, the birds may stay at the feeding grounds for one or more days. They disappear as suddenly as they appear. Just yesterday the dog raised great snipe or snipe one by one, and today the birds have suddenly practically disappeared - they have flown away.

Eruptions are not flocks of birds settled to rest, such as are observed in golden plovers, turukhtans, lapwings or dunlins. In the spill, each individual behaves independently, regardless of its neighbors. Being frightened, great snipe, snipe or woodcock usually fly out one by one. Rarely two or three birds rise at once. The rest continue to remain in their places. Such behavior of birds gives the opportunity for a good dog to demonstrate his skills again and again, and for hunters to shoot, shoot, shoot ... until the trunks are hot. That is why snipe, great snipe, snipe, woodcock and quail have become classic objects of hunting with a gun dog, and it is this immoderate shooting that has led to a sharp decline in the number of great snipe and quail throughout Europe. Snipe and woodcock still retain their numbers. In the middle lane, you can still raise 30-40 woodcocks per day. However, the same fate awaits these birds if the number of hunters and pointing dogs increases.

In order to preserve stocks of quail and all "red game" - as the group of the above waders is called - it is necessary to periodically prohibit autumn hunting. Dogs can also be used to account for game on ornithological excursions. At the same time, it is important to pay attention to the degree of constancy of the timing of the appearance of rashes. They may vary from year to year depending on climatic conditions, but the average dates are quite constant. The snipe flies earlier than others, the rashes of which are common in the period from 8 to 14 September. But in some years, the great snipe may appear in the middle lane as early as the end of August. Great snipes are extremely rare in the second decade of September, although M.V. Kalinin met individual birds even in the third decade, when there is a massive migration of snipe and harshnep. The latest sightings of these birds near Leningrad were recorded after snowfall - on November 7 and 8, and woodcock - on November 10.

The ability to form rashes undoubtedly makes it easier for birds to find feeding places, but it turns out to be fatal for them when faced with well-aimed hunters and a well-working dog. It is easiest to shoot the great snipes. When taking off, they emit a low quack, fly straight and not far. It is not difficult to get obese quails. In the Crimea and the Caucasus, they are even covered with nets. It is much more difficult to shoot at a woodcock rapidly soaring like a candle among the spruce and alder thickets. Snipe is also not an easy target. It flies at a very high speed, and not in a straight line, but rushing from side to side. Apparently, the term "sniper" was originally a hunting term and owes its origin to the snipe. Snipe in English snipe. The one who shot snipes well was called a sniper.

But how do breakouts occur? How to explain the almost simultaneous appearance of dozens of birds in a limited area of ​​land and their simultaneous disappearance? If woodcocks and great snipes flew in a flock, like ducks or geese, then questions would disappear by themselves. However, no one has yet seen the nocturnal flocks of great snipes and woodcocks. K. V. Bolshakov, who studied the night migration of birds for several years in a row, only once noted three woodcocks flying together. The overwhelming majority of birds flew alone. However, there are up to hundreds of birds on the rash! How do they gather in one place? This question essentially remains open. As B. Obydenov rightly notes, it requires a special discussion and accumulation of new exact facts. It is sometimes believed that the formation of rashes can be explained by the ability of each bird to find, independently of the others, the best feeding places that come across on the way at the end of the night migration. However, there are much more good lands than there are rashes. Birds settle for daytime rest not far from one another. Apparently, they still have some, still unknown to us, means of communication that allow them to keep in touch with each other both on the migration route and at the feeding grounds.

The vocal signal emitted during nocturnal migration is characteristic of the snipe. It sounds especially often at the start and before landing. At evening dawns, it is sometimes possible to observe how snipe one after another at certain intervals start in the same direction, guided by the cry of individuals flying over them. Great snipes also emit a voice signal at the start, but they have a quiet one and its communicative meaning has not yet been determined. In general, the behavior of snipes to some extent resembles the behavior of other nocturnal migrants flying alone, such as white-browed thrushes. The migratory signals of the harrier and woodcock are not known to us. This does not mean that they do not have acoustic or other means of communication during the migration period. Special observations are needed on the behavior of these shorebirds in places where they stop for rest, concentrating in a limited area, and restore strength for further advancement to wintering grounds. Only new facts can shed light on the nature of the formation of rashes of hunting bird species.

Bird infestations. Invasions are called irregular mass migrations of birds, performed both within the range of the species and outside it. They are not necessarily associated with a specific season, but are most often observed in the autumn-winter period, when, due to crop failure of the main feed, birds begin to move in search of food. In areas poor in food, they do not linger, but in places with an abundance of food they settle and remain there until the food supply runs out. With enough food, they stay here all winter and leave the area only before spring. This is how rowan thrushes often behave during rowan harvest years. Crossbills, falling into the zone of mass fruiting spruce usually in summer, live here for a whole year. In winter, they breed, and in the spring and summer of the following year, they begin to roam again with the young. Sometimes some birds stay in the breeding area for another year or two.

A classic example of invasive migrations is provided by the Siberian nutcracker. During the years of poor harvest of pine nuts, she makes distant wanderings, during which she flies to the European part of the USSR, and sometimes to Central Europe and Scandinavia. The raids of Siberian nutcrackers in central Russia and the Baltic states are a relatively rare occurrence. According to E. V. Kumari, over the past 25 years, nutcracker invasions have been observed here only twice - in 1954 and 1968. The last invasion was the most significant. The mass appearance of birds is preceded by the flight of single individuals, which can sometimes be seen already at the end of July. In August, September and October, nutcrackers are quite common during the years of the raid, but from November "on excursions again mostly solitary birds come across. Nutcrackers feed on seeds of coniferous trees, nuts, berries, mushrooms, insects. They visit grazing areas where they peck out dung beetles from cow dung.When winter sets in, many birds begin to suffer from starvation, emaciate and die.However, those that fall into favorable conditions survive the winter and even breed in the spring.

Nutcrackers, if they appeared, are hard not to notice. They constantly make cracking sounds and let them get close to them. The nutcracker is slightly smaller than the jackdaw. The color of its plumage is brownish-brown with white streaks that cover the entire body, except for the top of the head. When taking off from the ground, it spreads its tail, and then a white border is visible, running along the edge of the tail, like a turtledove. All data on the behavior of Siberian nutcrackers in the European part of the USSR are of great scientific interest.

Of the other invasive birds that can be encountered on autumn-winter excursions, we point out the waxwing and smurf wintering at the latitude of Leningrad and Moscow during the years of the harvest of rowan berries. Usually these birds are observed in middle latitudes on migration in late autumn and early spring. Invasive raids are also characteristic of the long-tailed tit and Muscovy, jay, three-toed woodpecker and some owls, in particular hawk and polar (white). The specific causes of invasions in most of these birds are not yet clear. We can only say that they arise due to lack of food. But in what part of the range the invasion originates, how far it extends, and what is the fate of the birds involved in non-periodic migration - these questions can only be resolved by collecting new facts.

Composition and distribution of autumn-winter avifauna

In winter, most birds live in flocks. Only poison dart frogs, as well as birds leading a predatory lifestyle (diurnal predators, owls, gray shrike), prefer to stay alone or at a distance of voice contact with each other. Corvids and tits tend to form flocks, which include representatives of different species. Mixed flocks of tits are often joined by woodpeckers, nuthatches and pikas, usually leading a solitary lifestyle. All this leads to a very uneven distribution of birds over the territory.

The species composition of wintering birds in our country is not rich. Approximately two-thirds of all species fly to more southern latitudes. From the north, only waxwing, tap-dancing, scurry, snow bunting, dipper, sometimes buzzard and hawk owl arrive. In the absence of food, they do not linger for a long time in the middle and central regions, but pass through them in transit. Forest species and birds predominate among wintering birds, whose life is more closely than others connected with human activity. Birds of wetland and open stations fly away almost all. Only in some places, individual individuals or flocks of ducks and divers remain to winter near the non-freezing water. Sometimes grebes hibernate, dippers and kingfishers appear, and in the fields in the years of abundance of rodents, upland buzzards and long-eared owls linger until the middle of winter.

The total number of birds in winter is also low, especially in years of poor harvest of rowan, coniferous and alder seeds. Even among the so-called sedentary species, found in the same area all year round, only a part of the individuals are settled, the rest migrate. As a rule, old birds that have already nested here remain in place. Juveniles sometimes travel considerable distances. This was established with the help of banding and turned out to be typical for the goshawk, the hooded crow, and some tits. Similar examples of false settled habitation of birds, apparently, are characteristic of many birds of the middle zone. All this makes us treat the concept of a "sedentary" species with great caution. A sedentary lifestyle can lead individual individuals, but not all representatives of the species of a particular area. On ornithological excursions, this should be kept in mind when explaining the reasons for the extremely low number of birds in winter. By systematic feeding, however, it is possible to force both young crows and tits to live in one place throughout the year. Under natural conditions, absolutely sedentary species probably do not exist. Even for such seemingly strictly sedentary species as the house sparrow, magpie, hazel grouse or capercaillie, the phenomenon of the autumn resettlement of young animals is characteristic.

So, the poverty of the species composition, the low number and uneven distribution of birds over the territory are the main features of the state of the winter avifauna, which must be taken into account when organizing winter ornithological excursions. The weather is also of great importance - one should strive to go on excursions on clear, sunny days, when the birds are most active. In bad weather they are almost invisible and inaudible. The route should be long and cover forest areas, edges, parks and the outskirts of towns or cities. If there are ice-free springs or a fast-flowing river with polynyas in the observation area, then such places must be visited. You can always find something interesting here.

Birds in the backyards of villages, city dumps and roads. In winter, more birds can be found on the outskirts of towns and cities than in the forest. The concentration is especially felt after snowfalls, when it becomes difficult for birds to forage from under the snow. Near human habitation, they can always find something to profit from. Even such a seemingly completely wild bird, like a gray partridge, often flies to feed on the outskirts of villages, where it visits roads, weeds and heaps of straw. Where the gray partridges have been, they leave kopankas and chains of tracks similar to chicken ones, but smaller in size, in the snow. These birds usually stay in a flock of 15-20 pieces, and their tracks are very numerous and confusing. At night, partridges fly to a forest edge protected from the wind. Here, gathered in a tight bunch, they spend a frosty night. In winters with little snow, they do not use the snow as a night shelter. However, after heavy snowfalls, gray partridges burrow into the snow, choosing places where it is the deepest. In severe frosts, they sit there sometimes during the day. If you are careful, you can ski very close to the partridges sitting in the snow. Sometimes they fly out from under the very feet with such a crash and noise that an inexperienced person may be frightened. Note that black grouse fly out of the snow holes one after another, but partridges are always all at once. In the holes where partridges spent the night, you can find excrement accumulated overnight - heaps of light brown sausages about 2 centimeters long.

On the outskirts of villages and settlements in autumn and winter, however, first of all, magpies, jackdaws and crows attract attention. Their concentration begins already in the early morning, just dawn breaks.

In the villages, they immediately fly to search the garbage dumps, where they find various garbage: crusts of bread, offal, pieces of potatoes from spilled soup, etc. Magpies fly here one after another from the surrounding groves. Up to 20-25 birds sometimes gather in one dump. In another season, it is impossible to meet such a number of forty in one place. There is no better time to observe the habits of these birds. Particular attention should be paid to the nature of the flight of magpies through open spaces, their ability to descend vertically down to the intended place from a great height, the function of their long tail and short and blunt wings. The magpie flies always high above the field, showing a type of unevenly flapping flight. Her tail acts as a stabilizer and a rudder. Sharp turns are carried out with the help of wings and tail.

There are especially many gray crows and jackdaws in city dumps, near meat processing plants and large pigsties. Tens of thousands of these birds gather here every year. They flock here from a large area, sometimes arriving from other areas. Essentially, this is their wintering ground. Every morning the birds go to feed, and in the evening they fly to the city to spend the night. Rooks join flocks of crows at the beginning of winter. Ravens can also be found here. Crows and jackdaws stay in a flock, sometimes very large. Crows - in pairs or one at a time. Meeting them is especially interesting. These are our largest songbirds. They keep pairs for many years. They are careful and do not let you get close. In addition to their large size and black plumage, they can be recognized by their characteristic, usually double, “kruk-kruk” call.

It is most interesting to observe gray crows and jackdaws in the evening, when they begin to fly from the outskirts of cities to the central regions, where it is warmer and the wind does not blow so much. Batch after batch, with a wide front and greatly stretched in depth, the birds fly in one direction. Having chosen a group of buildings or some public garden with tall trees, and sometimes even building cranes, they settle down for the night at dusk, raising an incredible hubbub at the same time. At the same time, you can hear the voices of thousands of birds and record them on a tape recorder. Scrolling later on the tape, it is easy to see that the bird signals are subject to great individual variability. Crows and jackdaws spend a long cold winter night huddled close to each other, fluffing their feathers and hiding their heads under their wings. As soon as dawn breaks, they again fly to feed. It is interesting to note that in March and April, when local birds are already starting to build nests and lay eggs, daily flights of crows, although on a smaller scale, still continue. Thus, there is reason to believe that flocks of crows consist of immature one- or two-year-old individuals. Old, that is, already nesting, birds spend the night in pairs near their nests all winter from autumn.

A wonderful object for autumn observations is seagulls. They demonstrate the intraspecific diversity of foraging methods and types of flight, the age-related variability of plumage, and the phenomenon of diurnal migrations.

Autumn concentrations of gulls in suburban landfills are now as common as gatherings of corvids. This is especially typical for the territory of the Baltic States and the regions adjacent to it. In the suburbs of Leningrad, thousands of seagulls gather annually at landfills and at the meat processing plant. This phenomenon has been formed over the past decades, with the general increase in the number of gulls. Until late autumn, and sometimes until the middle of winter, landfills are visited mainly by blue-gray and the most numerous black-headed gulls. They spend the night on the coast of the Gulf of Finland, 10-15 kilometers from the feeding places. As the sun rises, thousands of birds flock to the outskirts of Leningrad and the Neva. Seagulls fly dispersed, on a wide front, in small groups or singly. The flight for feeding lasts several hours, and at the end of the day the return movement to the coast begins. Seagulls spend the dark time of the day on the shallows, standing near the water. The next day, the same thing is repeated: the birds fly in the same direction and at the same hours, maintaining the strict rhythm of the daily cycle of autumn-winter life.

Street rock pigeons, more than any other birds, depend on the person who feeds them in all seasons of the year. However, they, as can be observed in the mornings and evenings, make regular fodder flights. In autumn, after harvesting, they fly out of cities and villages to adjacent fields, where they collect seeds of weeds, grain crops and peas. They flock to granaries and flour mills.

On the outskirts of the villages you can always meet sparrows, both field and house sparrows. Both species often stay together - feeding or resting. They spend the night in various shelters, and in frosts they even clog into the chimneys of houses, from where they crawl out in the morning very darkened. In field sparrows, the winter coloring of plumage is about the same. like in summer. In males, the house sparrow has a large black spot on the throat and goiter, so well pronounced in summer, at the beginning of winter it is almost imperceptible. After the autumn molt, it is hidden by light edges of feathers overlapping each other. This example illustrates well that color change in birds is not always associated with a change in feather, that is, with molting. Sometimes the so-called mating signs arise from the wear of the dull end parts of the pen and the protrusion of its brighter inner parts.

Field sparrows are much more mobile than house sparrows. They constantly make flights outside the village or town to vegetable gardens and wastelands overgrown with wormwood, quinoa and burdock. Here goldfinches, linnets, greenfinches and bullfinches feed on weed seeds, and in years of poor harvest of alder seeds, also tap dances.

Field sparrows always stay in a friendly flock. Having fed on quinoa seeds and emitted a short “tweet” signal, they take off at once and fly away rapidly. Bullfinches appear on wastelands usually at the end of winter, when the stocks of berries and seeds on the trees are depleted. Then they switch to feeding on the seeds of weeds sticking out from under the snow. At this time, birds often jump in the snow from bush to bush, leaving characteristic traces. Illuminated by the oblique rays of the January sun, bright red (from below) and bluish-gray from above, with a black cap, the male bullfinch on the snow is an amazingly beautiful sight. No less spectacular and carduelis. Their plumage has yellow, black, brown, white and red (on the head) tones. Goldfinches usually appear in the backyards of villages from August. At this time, they like to visit sunflowers and peck seeds out of them. Later, when the shells of sunflower seeds harden, the goldfinches stop feeding on them, since they are no longer able to clear the hard husk from the seed. In autumn and winter, the seeds of thistle, burdock, wormwood and quinoa become the main food for carduelis. Goldfinches feed on thistles in autumn, while seeds of other plants are eaten throughout the winter. Feeding on the thistle, the goldfinch sits on its top. From time to time he bends down, takes a seed from the inflorescence, bites off a white fly and blows it into the wind like a soap bubble. In early summer, he does the same with dandelion seeds.

Of the small birds on the outskirts of the villages, you can also meet ordinary buntings. They are about the size of a sparrow, but have a longer tail carved at the end. In the coloration of their plumage, yellowish and chestnut (on the uppertail) tones are striking. In autumn and early winter, these birds, like male house sparrows, are less brightly colored than in spring and summer. By spring, the yellow color on the head and underside of the body becomes more noticeable due to wear of the dull colored terminal parts of the feathers. Buntings often stay together with sparrows on heaps of straw and manure or jump along the roads, picking up scattered grains. They constantly fly from place to place, making a jerky beeping call like "tsk" or "tsrk". In the central and southern regions, along with sparrows and buntings, crested larks can also be found in the backyards and roads in the countryside, staying here for the winter. These are grayish birds slightly larger than a sparrow with a tufted head.

In winter, on the roads near villages and villages, it is sometimes possible to see a flock of snow bunting, and in late autumn - also Lapland plantains and polar, or horned, larks. All these birds nest in the high latitudes of the Arctic and winter in the central and southern regions of the country. In the middle lane, they are usually found on the spring and autumn migration. Horned larks (older birds) can be recognized by dark markings on the crop, cheeks and crown, as well as by the "horns" sticking out at the top of the head. The voice is a gentle and melodic very high trill. In Lapland plantain, against an almost black background of the head and goiter, a large light eyebrow is striking. The rest of the plumage is white (underside) and rusty brown with dark streaks. This bird makes a dry crackle in flight.

Predators wintering near dwellings."Predator" is an ecological concept. This is an animal leading a predatory lifestyle. Among the birds wintering in the middle latitudes, not only hawks and falcons, but also some owls are engaged in predation, and among passerine birds, the gray shrike.

Of the hawks, the most common goshawk can be found - the largest hawk, weighing up to 1.5 kilograms. Female goshawks are always larger than males. They sometimes even attack hares and capercaillie. Chasing prey, the goshawk flies low, overtaking the victim in a short time. Its flight can be extremely swift, despite its short and blunt wings. Sometimes goshawks rise to a fairly significant height and circle in the air for a long time, combining flapping flight with gliding. Near dwellings, they are found only in winter, when hunger forces them to appear on the outskirts of villages and even in cities. Here the hawk is attracted by the abundance of crows and jackdaws, domestic pigeons, as well as chickens roaming near the houses. Pursuing the victim, the goshawk is so bold that sometimes it flies into the yard or even into the barn or canopy, where it often becomes a prisoner. In Leningrad, a case is known when a female goshawk, chasing a pigeon, flew with him into a room in a residential building, breaking through both windows. Old goshawks have a striated coloration of the underside of the body. In young immature birds, there is a longitudinal drop-shaped hatching of the chest and belly. In the middle latitudes, mainly old birds winter.

The sparrowhawk is generally a migratory bird. However, some individuals, finding rich prey in the form of sparrows and buntings on the outskirts of towns and cities, sometimes spend the whole winter in old suburban parks and city dumps. In harvest years for mountain ash, when field thrushes and waxwings linger for a long time in the middle latitudes, sparrowhawks winter with us in much larger numbers than usual. On excursions, you meet this predator unexpectedly: it suddenly breaks off the roof of a barn or from a heap of manure, on which it plucked a sparrow or waxwing that fell into its paws, and quickly disappears somewhere around the corner.

Buzzards, or Rough-legged Buzzards, come across in the largest numbers on excursions in mid-October, during a mass migration. In November and December there are already few of them, but in warm winters and in years of high abundance of mouse-like rodents in the fields, individual individuals spend the whole winter with us. They sometimes hover over fields adjacent to villages. It is not difficult to recognize them. The white underside of the wings with dark streaks at the carpal fold, the dark belly and the light fan-shaped tail are striking.

During the years of the invasion of waxwings, the number of Merlins wintering in the middle latitudes also increases. They also concentrate near settlements, where waxwings and other small birds - sparrows and buntings hunt. Some individuals even fly into cities to cemeteries and large parks. Like all falcons, the Merlin's flight is swift. It has longitudinal streaks on the underside of the body, pointed wings and a relatively short tail.

On the outskirts of cities and villages, two more small predators live in winter. One of them is night, the other is daytime. Both are attracted here by the abundance of sparrows. The first of them is the sparrow owl, the smallest of our owls, the size of a waxwing: the mass of males barely reaches 60 grams, females, which are larger, 75 grams. The pygmy owl feeds mainly on mouse-like rodents, partly on shrews, but in the years of the absence of rodents it switches to sparrows. When you look at a sitting owl from afar, you initially think that it is a very large and heavily fluffy sparrow that has lost its tail. The latter, by the way, sometimes happens to house sparrows in winter if they spend the night in the crevices of buildings, closely clinging to the wall. Coming closer, you will soon recognize an owl in this small and stocky bird by its large head and large yellow eyes. In addition to its small size, the pygmy owl differs from other owls in two biological features: the nature of the flight, which is completely different from the owl, and the ability to arrange food supplies from autumn, which they use during the winter. The flight of the owl is swift and very maneuverable. It flies in a jerky way, either flapping its wings, or pressing them to the body. This is how woodpeckers and many passerine birds fly. Stocks pygmy owl arranges in hollows. They found up to 80 victims, mostly voles. In city squares in winter, one can sometimes see sparrows dragging sparrows into hollows, in which they first of all eat off the head.

In the same way, the gray shrike deals with its victim. It is the largest of our shrike, which is why it is sometimes called the great shrike. It is a rather cautious bird. Usually she sits motionless in a conspicuous place, looking for prey. When frightened, it flies off to the side in an undulating flight. The shrike hunts for sparrows in different ways. As a rule, he catches them shortly, throwing himself at his prey suddenly. Not having claws as sharp as those of a hawk, he cannot hold the victim in his paws and seeks to tear off her head as soon as possible. He does this with amazing speed, using a strong beak, armed with a special prong on the beak. Falcons also have a similar adaptation, which also kills the victim by dismembering her cervical vertebrae with the help of a beak and a tooth. Sometimes the shrike pursues the sparrow for a long time, taking it to starvation. At the same time, the predator, saving forces, always shortens its path. He flies up to a tired sparrow in a straight line after he, having made a huge loop over the field, again returns to the village. The gray shrike also attacks rodents. He often impales headless animals on a sharp branch or thorn of a bush.

Among other predators that occasionally hibernate near human habitation, we point out the gray owl, which sometimes lives in empty buildings in the suburbs, as well as the long-eared owl, which occurs in years of abundance of rodents.

Birds near unfrozen water. In mild winters, not uncommon in the western regions, the rivers freeze very late. Ice breaks on them in December and even in January. Large polynyas persist throughout the winter. In such places, gray and black-headed gulls stay all autumn and part of winter. On the non-freezing rapids of large and small rivers, mallard ducks day-dreaming, among which drakes predominate.

At night, they fly off to feed in fields, suburban dumps, and the like. In recent years, the number of wintering mallard ducks has increased dramatically, especially in large cities, in particular in Moscow and Leningrad, where warm industrial waters prevent rivers from freezing. There has been a process of urbanization of the mallard. Ducks began to nest even in the central areas of cities.

On the fast-flowing non-freezing rivers of the North-West, for example, on Vuoksa, flocks of long-tailed ducks, goldeneyes and individual males of the large merganser also remain for the winter. In the west of central Russia and in the Baltics, in clear water, wintering red-headed pochards and solitary grebes - great grebe, red-necked and small grebes - can be found. On the polynyas of the Gulf of Finland, whooper swans sometimes live for a long time.

In early November, when the water is already covered with an ice crust in the swamps between the hummocks and the first snow falls, the last flying harchneps linger at the springs on the non-freezing windows of the water. Being frightened, the harrier flies out almost from under the very feet. Silently or making a low quacking sound, it soars high up, and then, spreading its wings, flies for some time gliding like a butterfly, you won’t understand in which direction.

It is especially gratifying to meet a dipper on a winter ornithological excursion. In our country, it is rare everywhere and occurs in large numbers only in the southern mountainous regions, where in one day you can observe more than ten wintering birds at the same time. Dipper is the only representative of the passerine order that has mastered the aquatic environment to a certain extent. It is distinguished by the ability to dive under water, move in the water column, flapping its wings, and run along the bottom in search of aquatic insects and their larvae, which are its main food. Individuals wintering in the middle latitudes forage for themselves in the water even in severe frosts. Sometimes the dipper dives into one polynya and emerges from the next one. More often, however, it feeds on shallow fast-flowing rivers near rifts. Here the bird roams over the rocks with water rolling over its back. Dipper is the size of a starling, but more corpulent and with a tail upturned. She is all brown, only her neck and chest are white.

The kingfisher got its name, apparently, because in winter it stays near spring water. However, in the middle lane, meeting with him is a rare occurrence. Flocks of granivorous finches - tap dances, greenfinches, goldfinches and bullfinches - very often keep near non-freezing springs and rivers. Solitary robins and blackbirds visit such places and linger until snow falls. All these birds come here to drink and sometimes bathe.

Feeding forest birds

The life of forest birds in autumn and winter proceeds, on the whole, monotonously, and consists essentially of sleeping and searching for food. Long frosty nights are a critical time for many birds, especially smaller ones. During the short December day, the bird should be sufficiently satiated so as not to freeze at night, and it spends almost all daylight hours searching for food. Therefore, it is not surprising that on autumn-winter excursions, most often you have to observe birds feeding. According to the nature of the diet of forest birds wintering in the middle latitudes, it can be conditionally divided into several groups.

Berry consumers. The importance of various berries in the nutrition of birds is enormous. Many species of birds feed on them, even those that are considered exclusively insectivorous, such as flycatchers. However, not all species are well studied in this respect. Not in all cases, the timing of the transition of birds to berry nutrition is also clear.

This usually happens already in the summer, when the strawberries ripen. Thrushes are especially fond of eating strawberries - fieldfare, songbird and white-browed, but in the forest their activity is hardly noticeable, as it takes place in the grass under the forest canopy. At the same time, thrushes feed on the ground always in dispersed groups. Eating strawberries, thrushes undoubtedly contribute to its resettlement in new clearings. All types of thrushes also eat blueberries, as can be judged by their purple droppings left on the ground. However, the main consumers of this berry, as well as blueberries, are grouse, whose broods concentrate on blueberries in summer, and move to lingonberries and cranberries by autumn. In winters with little snow, black grouse feed on lingonberries even in December and January. Snowy cranberries are an essential part of the food ration for capercaillie, black grouse and ptarmigan even in early spring. In cranberry-producing years, even mallard ducks fly out at night to moss swamps in autumn to pick berries. In swamps, cloudberries and cranberries feed on common cranes. This is not difficult to establish by analyzing their droppings. Again, various types of thrushes and many warblers feed on raspberry "berries". They pinch off individual stones from the berry and leave it half-eaten. In large quantities, birds also eat bird cherry (singing thrush, redwing, jay, oriole), elderberry, honeysuckle (warbler). A lot of both granivorous and insectivorous birds feed on berries of irgi, or cinnamon, at the end of summer. But the most important in the nutrition of birds is, of course, mountain ash. During the years of its harvest, the number of rowan thrushes, waxwings, schurov and bullfinches, the main consumers of rowan berries, sharply increases. However, it is easier to observe these birds near human dwellings, and we will talk about them in the section "Birds in home gardens and on fodder tables."

Consumers of seeds and vegetative parts of coniferous trees. Of the birds that feed on the seeds of coniferous trees, most often on excursions you have to meet a large spotted woodpecker. It is found everywhere where the coniferous forest grows. Especially a lot of it in pine forests. On the Karelian Isthmus, for example, you can hardly get off the train at the Repino or Komarovo station, as he is right there. Sits on a tree or telegraph pole and hollows out a pine cone, eating out seeds from it. This is his main food throughout the autumn and winter. It is worth some time to look at the "work" of the woodpecker. The sequence of his actions is strictly defined. A large motley woodpecker hammers cones at the so-called forge. This is either a gap in a tree, or a special recess made by a woodpecker in the trunk. Having hollowed out a cone and taking out seeds from it, the woodpecker flies to a neighboring tree after another, which it brings in its beak to the same place. Then, with a sharp movement of the head and neck, he throws out the old cone and inserts the newly brought one into the forge. If there are a lot of cones, then the woodpecker uses the same forge for a long time. In this case, a whole mountain of cones processed by a woodpecker accumulates under a tree during the winter.

The life of crossbills is most closely connected with coniferous trees. In the middle lane, all three species living in the USSR can be found: spruce, pine and white-winged crossbill. The pine tree is most closely associated with pine, the spruce tree with spruce, and the white-winged crossbill with larch. However, all three species can feed on both spruce seeds and pine and larch seeds.

Spruce is the most common and widespread species, but it occurs and breeds chicks with us irregularly, only during the harvest years of spruce seeds, about 2-3 times a decade. This does not mean that crossbills are less prolific than other passerine birds, which usually breed annually. Having finished breeding, the crossbills, together with young birds that usually leave their nests in March, begin to roam again in spring in search of a spruce fruiting area. However, they sometimes travel hundreds of kilometers. During wanderings, they were noted even in absolutely treeless areas - in the steppes and semi-deserts. Having found places favorable for food, they settle down and start breeding here next winter.

Near Leningrad and Moscow, during the years of fruiting, spruce crossbills were eaten, which were absent before, begin to appear as early as June. During July, August and September, their number noticeably increases. At this time, they still lead a nomadic lifestyle, constantly changing their place of residence. Crossbills keep in flocks of 15-30 birds. Most often we see them flying over the forest. Their flight, like that of other finches, is undulating. Birds continuously call to each other in high, abrupt voices "tik-tik-tik ...". When the crossbills, having found a spruce hung with cones, settle in its crown and start feeding, their voice becomes lower, clattering: "tsok-tsok-tsok ...". Taking out the seeds, the birds are suspended from the cone itself. Often the cone under the weight of the bird breaks off and flies down. When a flock of crossbills feeds, the cones fall to the ground one after another. If you collect these cones, you can be sure that many of them are completely intact, while the rest retain a large number of seeds. Thus, crossbills feed very unproductively. However, the seeds in these cones do not disappear, but, as A.N. Formozov noted, they are food for other animals, in particular squirrels, which use them not only in autumn and winter, but also in the summer of the next year, when in the cones remaining hanging on the trees, the seeds are gone.

Crossbills are wonderful birds in many respects, but above all they attract attention with the unusual structure of the beak and the ability to breed in the middle of winter at an air temperature of minus 30-35 degrees. The structure of the beak indicates a long-standing and close relationship of crossbills with coniferous trees. The ends of their jaws are curved and cross. This makes it possible for the bird to easily bend back the cover scales tightly pressed to each other and extract the seeds with the help of a mobile and strong tongue. It is interesting that the crossbilly chicks still have a straight beak, the same as that of the fledglings of other finches. The curvature of the jaws occurs already after departure from the nest, according to the observations of T. A. Rymkevich, at about one and a half months of age.

The mating behavior of crossbills begins shortly after the completion of the molt, usually in November. Males actively sing, sitting on the tops of fir trees, make current flights, chasing females. Sometimes you can see how they feed them. This is one of the elements of the courtship ritual. Pairs form in December. Their number is gradually increasing, as new and new batches of crossbills still continue to arrive in the breeding area. In this regard, the general terms of building a nest and laying eggs in crossbills stretch for several months. Fresh clutches can be found from January to May. However, the bulk of the chicks appear in March, when the spruce seeds have become the most nutritious, but have not yet spilled out of the cones. Thus, the breeding timing of crossbills is controlled by the food factor, and not by light, as in other birds. The development of their gonads falls on the darkest time of the year.

The nest of the crossbill is built from twigs of coniferous trees, lichens and moss and is most often located on a pine tree at a height of 5-15 meters, but when nesting in forest moss swamps, it is much lower. In these cases, crossbills nest on small pines and spruces at a height of 1.5-3 meters from the ground. Naturally, such nests are more convenient for regular observations. The female crossbill usually lays 4, less often 3 or 5 bluish eggs with reddish-brown spots in the nest. The chicks hatch with dark down on the head, shoulders, back, elbows, thighs, shins and belly. The degree of pubescence of their body is not at all greater than that of the nestlings of other finches. The nature of the location of the fluff is about the same. Thus, it is not possible to install special protective devices in their "clothes". The female protects them from frosts and snowfalls, which constantly sits on the chicks and heats them with her body until they fledge. The total duration of the stay of the chicks in the nest is about three weeks.

When the females sit on the eggs, the behavior of the crossbills becomes less noticeable. At this time, males are busy foraging and sing much less frequently. They fly up to the nest no more than 2-3 times per hour, but immediately bring large portions of food, consisting of peeled spruce seeds. The male gives food to the female, and she feeds the chicks.

Of the passerine birds that feed on the vegetative parts of coniferous trees, we will point out the smurfs. In mid-latitudes, they usually occur on migration - in late autumn and late winter, when their spring movement to the north already begins. Most often they can be seen in the spruce forest. They always keep in flocks. Birds constantly call to each other with short quiet whistles "fi-fi" or make louder iridescent sounds "luli-luli". It is very interesting to watch the smurks during their stops for rest and feeding. They are not shy and can let you in at close range. These are rather large birds, their plumage, as well as that of crossbills, varies greatly depending on age and sex: old males are crimson-pink, young males (up to two years old) are orange, females are greenish-gray with a yellow bloom. Through binoculars, you can see how and what the squirrels eat. Sitting on the upper or side branches of fir trees, from time to time they stretch out and, bending their neck, bite off a kidney from the end of the branch. Before swallowing, the schur cleans it from the husk. Spruce and pine buds form the basis of the diet of schurs. However, they are very willing to eat juniper and rowan seeds. During the feeding of a flock of scours, some males fly up to the top of the spruce and emit loud melodious whistles. This is a song of the scum. It really enlivens the winter forest.

Pine needles serve as the basis for the winter nutrition of our largest forest bird - the capercaillie. The mass of an adult male is about 4.5 kilograms. Capercaillie live in winter mainly in white moss forests. However, it is rare to see this extremely cautious bird on excursions. Much more often one has to be content with the traces of her activities. First of all, these are trees on which capercaillie have recently fed. Under them, there are many fresh pine branches dropped by birds and capercaillie droppings, consisting of compressed needles that have passed through the intestinal tract. The crowns of the pines on which the capercaillie fed are usually heavily plucked. There are direct observations by M. V. Kalinin, indicating that capercaillie like to visit the same trees every day.

Capercaillie begins to feed on pine needles in the fall, when there is still no snow, but cold weather is already setting in. According to R. L. Potapov, it is precisely this, that is, a decrease in temperature and an increase in energy consumption, that determines the transition of the capercaillie to feeding on needles - food that is much more high-calorie than berries. For one feeding, he stuffs 200-250 grams of needles into the goiter. Sometimes capercaillie also eat spruce twigs, as well as berries and juniper needles, aspen leaves and larch needles. Black grouse occasionally also feeds on juniper berries and young pine cones. But mostly it feeds in winter on buds and catkins of deciduous trees.

Consumers of seeds and vegetative parts of hardwoods. In autumn and winter, birds, as a rule, have to be met on birch or alder. The main consumers of the seeds of these trees are tap and siskin. Tap dancers are especially often caught on excursions. They are usually seen flying over a field or undergrowth. From a distance, a flock of these birds sometimes looks like a dark moving cloud, constantly changing its shape. The birds are flying in a cluster, constantly uttering their calling call "chichichi-chii ..." - a sound very characteristic of the winter landscape. Having descended on a birch or alder, the tap-dancers literally sprinkle the crown of the tree with their little bodies. Having sat down in various poses, they look for surviving seeds in alder or birch cones, pinch earrings, and pull on the buds of trees. They are gullible, let them close, and being frightened, they do not fly off all at once. Some of them remain sitting on the tree. Then between the birds there is a roll call. They make the mournful call "pyyi". After the birds reunite, the flocks fly away. By the end of winter, when there are almost no seeds left in the cones, the tap dances feed on weeds - swan, nettle, wormwood. In the lean years for birch and alder seeds, they have been engaged in this activity since autumn.

The tap dance is slightly smaller than the sparrow. The color of their plumage is different depending on sex and age. This can be seen if, through binoculars, we examine in turn the tap dancers sitting on a tree. All birds have a crimson cap and a dark spot on the throat. The rest of the plumage is gray (females and young), but some (old males) have a pink coating on the chest.

Siskin in habits and general demeanor is similar to tap dancing. However, the voice of the siskins can always be recognized, even when they fly at a great distance: one hears the constantly repeated "tili-tii ...". The flight of siskins is swift and undulating. These are very lively and energetic birds, they often fly in flocks high above the forest. They are found in large numbers in September-October and in March-April, when they migrate. In the middle of winter they are quite rare, but during the years of harvest their main food - birch seeds - are very noticeable. During feeding, siskins make a big noise and draw attention to themselves from afar. From the top of the birch on which they are located, their various voices are heard: sawing, fragments of songs of old males, crackling chirping of quarreling birds, etc. They must be examined through binoculars. They are the same size as tap dancers. In males, the plumage is yellowish-green, the top of the head is black. Females do not have black on their heads. The general color of their plumage is greenish-gray with dark longitudinal streaks.

After the foliage leaves the birch trees, in the morning you can see large black birds on them. These are black grouse, for which buds, catkins and birch shoots are the main food in winter. To see black grouse during their feeding, you need to go on an excursion early and in the early morning hours be already among the birch undergrowth, away from the village. Black grouse are very careful, and you have to look at them from afar. In autumn, when males and females are still in common flocks, the appearance of birds sitting on birch trees is different. Some of them are black, only on the wings and under the tail they have patches of white feather. These are males. Hunters call them kosachs for their characteristic, long tail feathers curved outwards. They stand out clearly against the morning sky. Females, which are usually fewer in number, have brownish plumage. Birds fly noisily from one tree to another, and by how strongly the branches sway under them, we can conclude that black grouse are heavy birds. The mass of males is about 1.5 kilograms. Some of them sit motionless, others reach for earrings and kidneys. Their voices and the sound of wings are heard from afar. Suddenly the birds become alert and stretch their necks.

A nasal alarm call of "kookacarrka" is heard, and then, one after another, the black grouses noisily break out of the tree, frightened by the approach of people. The silhouette of flying grouse with short curved wings is very characteristic. When moving, the birds alternate between flapping and gliding flight, during which, despite their considerable mass, they do not lower their flight altitude. This is explained by the fact that the wings of black grouse, like other chickens, due to their convex-concave shape, have a significant lifting force: at a high gliding speed, the air pressure on them from below is stronger than from above.

Like capercaillie, black grouse burrow into the snow at night. In frosts, they sit in snow holes for almost the whole day and fly out to feed only once. For lodging for the night, areas with deep and loose snow are selected. Knowing the places where black grouse fly to spend the night, you can get quite close to them on skis. They fly out in turn, sometimes from under the very skis, raising clouds of snow dust. If you get to spend the night of a large flock (30-40 birds), then rapid take-offs and loud flapping of wings are heard from all sides. The departure of a large flock of black grouse from under the snow sometimes lasts several minutes and makes a great impression. During the thaw, black grouse usually do not burrow into the snow. Wet snow loses its thermal insulation properties and, in addition, the plumage of birds can become waterlogged. On clear and warm winter days, even before the New Year, you can hear the muttering of black grouse and see them from afar in the clearing. Having gathered in a group in one place, the males roam, lowering their wings, leaving crosses of traces and their "drawings" in the snow.

If the snow is deep enough, then the hole left by the black grouse has two holes: inlet and outlet - with traces of wings. The chamber in which the bird spends the night is under a layer of snow, and at the bottom of it you can always find excrement - sausages about 3 centimeters long, as well as the so-called caecum emissions - a thick oily liquid that impregnates the snow. In all grouse, the cecum is very well developed. Their purpose is to increase the suction surface and carry out further processing of the food extract that enters the blind processes after the passage of coarse branch food through the small intestine. Digestion in the caecum takes a day or two. Coarse food residues in the form of sausages are brought out much faster. Thus, thanks to the digestive function of the caecum, the nutrients contained in branch feeds are used by the grouse to the fullest. The study of the function of the caecum in birds is a relatively new issue of great general biological interest. The information presented above is based on the results of special studies conducted by O. I. Semenov-Tyanshansky, R. L. Potapov and A. V. Andreev. We refer readers to their works for more detailed information.

Traces of feeding of white partridges should be looked for in river valleys, on open shores of lakes, on burned areas and in other places where willow bushes and young birch trees grow, the buds and shoots of which partridges feed on in winter. Birds get them from the surface of the snow, running from bush to bush. The dense plumage of the legs facilitates their movement in the snow. Partridges are flocking birds, so where they fed, there are many footprints, paths going in different directions.

Hazel grouse feed on catkins and buds of alder, partly birch. In winter, they live in pairs or singly. It is difficult to see a hazel grouse while feeding. More often you have to scare him from a tree or from a snowy hole and observe in flight. The hazel grouse hole is smaller than the grouse, and the excrement at its bottom is shorter (about 2 centimeters) and usually painted in a rusty brown color.

So, the food connections of grouse birds in the autumn-winter period are quite definite. All of them feed on branch feeds, while the capercaillie is associated with pine, black grouse with birch, ptarmigan with willow, and hazel grouse with alder.

In autumn, when acorns ripen, you should definitely visit the old park or oak grove. There are usually many jays and nuthatches here, feeding on acorns at this time. The sharp and unpleasant voices of jays are especially often heard. One will scream, noticing a person, and immediately others join her. There is a crossover. Flickering white tails, jays begin to make short flights, and soon they all disappear. In the park, jays flock to oaks from a large area of ​​the adjacent forest. The most intense years are early in the morning and before sunset. Having stuffed the oral cavity and esophagus with acorns, the jay flies back to the forest, where it hides them in the forest floor in reserve. It sometimes brings acorns to a distance of several kilometers from oak plantations. Thus, the jay plays a large role in the settling of the oak. Hidden acorns are usually found in winter, and jays dig them out from under the snow. Traces of this activity in the form of diggers and imprints of feet and wings in the snow are often encountered during winter excursions in the park or oak grove.

The presence of a nuthatch in a park or forest is not difficult to establish. He constantly gives a voice, uttering his characteristic "twt-twt-twut ..." or "sit-sit-sit ...". First, a cry is heard, and then, by the voice, you find the bird itself. She always impresses with her ability to quickly climb tree trunks, and in all directions, even upside down. Having found an acorn, the nuthatch quickly thrusts it into the crack of a tree and begins to peck with its beak. On excursions, sometimes you come across such acorns inserted into the bark and half-eaten. The nuthatch returns to them repeatedly.

Insectivorous birds of the winter forest. In winter, sometimes you have to wander through the forest for a long time before you hear the voice of a bird. Most often these are the voices of tits and kinglets. Having heard a thin beeping coming from afar, you should head towards the sound, as in this case it may be possible to get acquainted with several species of birds at once. The "blue flock" usually consists of various types of tits, as well as yellow-headed kinglets that have joined them, often pikas, nuthatches, and even some kind of woodpecker. These birds are connected by common food - insects wintering on trees and seeds of coniferous plants. The most noticeable puffs, which are kept in sight and more often than others make sounds. When a person approaches, they begin to chik and hiss grumblingly "cidi-chshsh-chshsh-chshsh". Crested tits behave more modestly. Usually they jump in the crowns of pines, from where their trembling short trill "trre-trrere" is heard. Sometimes they go down very low, searching the stumps and the foot of the trees. It is impossible to confuse the crested tit with another bird: on its head it has a very high pointed crest of feathers with a scaly pattern. According to the observations of A.V. Bardin, powdery, crested tits, as well as chickadees tend to store food. Having found an insect or a pine seed, they hide food in a new place. The use of stocks is collective. Each flock of tits in the autumn-winter period has a certain territory, which it systematically searches. Stocks are used on days when food is difficult to find. Tits are especially active in storing food in September and October.

Yellow-headed beetles usually stay high in the crowns of trees, betraying their presence with an incessant thin whistle "sisisi-sisisi ...". Due to their very small size, they can be difficult to see among the dense crowns of spruces. You usually notice them when they fly from tree to tree in a fluttering flight or, rapidly flapping their wings, hang in the air at the end of a spruce paw. Occasionally they go down and feed on the lower branches. In this case, it is possible to consider all the details of their plumage and understand why this bird is called in Latin (regulus) and in Russian a kinglet, for the gold on its head.

Muscovites are also present in tit flocks in some years, and blue tit roam together with chickadees in deciduous groves.

Flocks of long-tailed tits keep apart. Birds deftly hang with their backs down to thin twigs and constantly fly from tree to tree in an undulating flight, accompanying their actions with the calling signal "sissy-si... sisisi...". Sometimes they also make a short "tsrr...tsrr". Feeding daily migrations have certain routes along which birds move, following one after another. In winter, flocks of long-tailed tits can most often be found in parks, deciduous or mixed groves, as well as in thickets of willow bushes, along river valleys or in swamps. Nights at these tits are public. Birds are closely pressed against each other, thereby reducing the total heat transfer surface and mutually heating each other. Without such collective thermoregulation, tits cannot survive a frosty night.

All tits are insectivorous, although most of them willingly eat the seeds of trees and grasses. From a forestry point of view, tits are of great value. These birds destroy a wide variety of forest pests, and throughout the year, thus performing important preventive work.

Of the other insectivorous birds on winter excursions in the forest, there are poison dart frogs - various types of woodpeckers, pika and nuthatch. All our woodpeckers are useful birds. The harm they cause - damage to wood, eating ants, destruction of seeds - is negligible, especially in comparison with the benefits that they bring, exterminating the most dangerous pests of the forest. Special studies by A. A. Inozemtsev showed that even in lean years for spruce and pine seeds, the largest spotted woodpecker in our country, which feeds exclusively on coniferous seeds all autumn and winter, is capable of destroying only a few percent of their total stock. All other species of our woodpeckers are insectivorous. Many of them are, in general, rare birds.

The three-toed woodpecker is common only during the years of its raid from the northern regions of the taiga. It is necessary to look for it in middle-aged spruce forests. During feeding, he sits for a long time on the same large tree, eating various bark beetles (engravers, printers) and their larvae. The white-backed woodpecker is associated in winter with birch stands. If a birch trunk is heavily infested with birch sapwood and barbel larvae, the woodpecker will peck at it for almost the whole day. Around the tree on which the white-backed woodpecker fed, wood dust, pieces of birch bark and rotten wood are usually lying around. The Lesser Spotted Woodpecker is quite a baby, and meeting with him is always pleasant. He is trusting and lets you get close. He often betrays his presence with a high, unhurried squeak - repeated several times in a row "bee-bee-bee-bee-bee". The flight, like all woodpeckers, is undulating. In winter, it adheres to deciduous low forests, floodplains, gardens and parks. Sometimes it flies even to large cities. The middle spotted woodpecker, living in the zone of mixed forests and oak forests, extracts insects from the surface of trunks, from cracks and folds of the bark. He rarely hammers wood. Gray-haired and green woodpeckers are similar in their food specialization. They also rarely hollow trees, and feed mainly on ants, which they get by digging up anthills. Most often, these woodpeckers are found in mixed or deciduous forests, as well as in parks.

The black woodpecker, or yellow, is the most colorful of all woodpeckers, attracting attention with its appearance and voice. His presence in the forest always pleases, and not only because when you meet him, the thought flashes: "It means that large trees are still preserved in the forests in which he can nest!" The very appearance of this bird is pleasing, at first glance awkward and unusual, but possessing an original attractive force. It is difficult to say what exactly is the unusualness and attractiveness of the black woodpecker. Everything in it, perhaps, is unusual: black plumage, some kind of wild look of almost colorless eyes with a very special pupil shape, the habit of peeking out from behind a tree trunk, a huge light beak that a woodpecker wields like a carpenter with a chisel. People call him the "black carpenter". In search of insects, he sometimes crushes huge old stumps and gouges large holes in tree trunks. There are cases when a black woodpecker got inside houses boarded up for the winter, making large holes in thick fresh boards and ate insects wintering in the house, including cockroaches. How, one wonders, could he guess that insects live in the house? It is also not clear what senses the black woodpecker is guided by when, gouging holes in the form of funnels in large spruce trees, it finally gets to the ants that live in the rotten wood of a thick tree. Is he looking at the tree, tapping, or maybe sniffing around? In a word, not everything is clear in the biology and behavior of the black woodpecker, although quite a few articles have been written about it.

Of particular interest are his voice reactions. They are more varied than other woodpeckers. On ornithological excursions, one often hears the intermittent trill of a woodpecker, which it emits on the fly, and, without fail, following it, when the yellow-bell sits on a tree, a loud plaintive cry “weaving”, repeated several times. What is the meaning of this cry? Territory security? Or maybe a cry of loneliness? It is perceived by the human ear as a call to its own kind. In any case, having issued a signal, the woodpecker listens for a long time, and having heard the answer, flies up, is interested. Nevertheless, black woodpeckers prefer to stay alone all autumn and part of winter. Maybe they still maintain voice contact with each other, but at a great distance? How else can one explain the onset of pair formation in the middle of winter? All these questions still need to be clarified.

Birds in household plots and on fodder tables

If there are fruit trees, a vegetable garden with potatoes, berry bushes on a personal plot, at least individual bushes of shadberry, elderberry and lilac grow, and mountain ash near the house, then observations on such a plot can be very interesting. During the summer and autumn here, almost on the spot, you can get acquainted with at least forty species of birds. If you regularly feed the birds on the feeding table, then the pleasure of looking at the birds can be extended until deep winter and early spring. On the feeders from the window of the house, sometimes it is possible to observe up to twenty species of birds.

On the homestead. A noticeable increase in birds in household plots begins as early as the end of July. Nuthatches, pikas, white-backed and small spotted woodpeckers, chickadees, great tits appear in the gardens. In search of insects, they scour the trunks and branches of fruit trees, jump over fences, where they catch spiders and flies. From time to time, a flock of half-molted finches and buntings make a stop on a personal plot. Timber pipits, yellow wagtails, coastal, village and city swallows, which have begun migration, constantly perch on the wires. White wagtails are sharply increasing in number. Catching insects, they quickly run along the paths and on the roofs of houses. Various chiffchaffs, warblers and warblers are hidden in potato plants. They are guarded there all day long by cats. To the surprise of everyone, they sometimes even bring home rare birds, whose presence had not been noticed before - garden warblers, buntings, nightingales. And only the strong love of the owners for their cats allows them not to notice the harm that their pets bring to the bird population.

The largest number of bird species at the end of July and in August flock to the berries of irgi, or currants. Irga is a typical home garden plant. Therefore, observations can be carried out without even leaving the front garden. One cinnamon bush and several days of observations are enough to get acquainted with 10-15 species of birds. They fly in and they fly out. Their composition changes all the time. Some, like the oriole, for example, will grab a berry and swallow it, and on the other, they will hurriedly fly to feed the chicks that are screaming in the distance. Some: lentils, linnet, greenfinch - linger longer. They eat away the core of the berry and leave empty shells hanging on the branches. The longest feeding are field sparrows, arriving in a whole herd. They will eat berries, rub their beak on a branch and fly away. Irgi bushes also like to visit all kinds of thrushes and warblers. Warblers, however, are more likely to eat smaller elderberries. Redstarts and flycatchers - pied and gray flycatchers also flock to elderberry and shadberry. The latter often picks a berry without sitting on a branch, on the fly, that is, the way it does when it catches a butterfly or a fly.

Ripe cherries attract thrushes, orioles and starlings to gardens. Of particular interest are observations of grosbeaks. These birds feed on the kernels of drupe fruits. Cherry kernels are their favorite food. To get to them, you need to free the bone from the pulp and split it, which the grosbeak does with its powerful beak. Dubonos fixes the bone in a strictly defined position, placing it on the edge and clamping it between two large tubercles located in the back of the horny palate. There is a clicking sound, and the bone splits into two halves along the seam. The pressure that the jaws of the grosbeak can develop, according to the observations of B.V. Nekrasov, is 45-72 kilograms. This bird is able to split even a small plum pit. Under the tree on which the grosbeak fed, one can find scattered pulp of cherries and many empty halves of stones. Having fed on cherries, the birds usually fly to the watering hole, and here it is immediately clear that they have flown in from the cherry orchard: their beaks, as if in blood, are stained with cherry juice.

Already from the end of August and in September, when the mountain ash turns orange-red, flocks of fieldfares begin to visit the estates. Somewhat later, at the end of September - October, waxwings join them. All autumn and winter, bullfinches come to feed on the remaining mountain ash, and in some years, especially rich in mountain ash, also smurfs.

Thrushes and waxwings will usually fly in a large flock, feed and fly away. They don't stay in one place for long. The most regular visitors to the estates are, perhaps, bullfinches. They do not form large flocks, they keep together several birds that can visit a certain area every day. With a quiet hoarse whistling, they sit down on the mountain ash and slowly take to their favorite food. If you carefully observe how bullfinches eat mountain ash, you can see that they throw away the pulp, and eat only seeds. Therefore, under the tree on which the bullfinches fed, you can always find rowan berries with a eaten-out middle in the snow. The same goes for scumbags. Bullfinches can also be seen feeding on ash and maple trees. In years of poor harvest of mountain ash, if there are a lot of ash seeds, these birds feed on them almost all winter and only at the end of it they switch to seeds of herbaceous plants.

In contrast to bullfinches, thrushes and waxwings are birds that spread rowan seeds. They swallow the berry whole, but digest only the pulp. Seeds are not digested and are carried along with feces, enter the soil and germinate. When we find a single-growing mountain ash in the forest, we can definitely say that it was brought here by birds.

The waxwing is a bird with a crest on its head, slightly smaller than a starling. Her coloring is extraordinary. Through binoculars it is possible to see a dark stripe running through the eye, black throat and yellow stripes on the tail and wings. From a close distance, you can still see blood-red horny plates at the ends of the flight and tail feathers, which are characteristic only for waxwings. Rowan is their favorite food. These birds are extremely voracious and are able to clear the entire tree of berries in a short time. Fieldfare thrushes seem to compete with waxwings. They stay in autumn and winter in large flocks, sometimes numbering hundreds of birds. Sometimes they fly into chokeberry bushes and eat them. Being in a flock, fieldfare thrushes continuously call to each other in shrill and crackling voices. They are careful and do not let them get close to them. They have to be looked at from a distance. During feeding, some of the thrushes are always at observation posts, the rest hastily peck berries, while the birds constantly change places. The alarm cry of sentinel birds raises the whole flock into the air.

On the feeders. Bird feeders in the windows and feeding tables in the garden can bring a lot of joy to people and benefit to the birds. It is always a pleasure to look at birds up close: color details, new behavioral traits, and nutritional features are revealed. Here the birds seem more beautiful and sweeter than from afar. You just need to remember that you can not deceive the birds. You need to feed them systematically, without interruptions, otherwise you can harm them. Many of them lingered and began to lead a sedentary life only because of feeding. Accustomed to finding food in a certain place every day, if they do not find it, they will wait, waste time and energy, and may die on frosty days.

The great tit visits feeders more willingly than others. This is the most common of the tits. With her mobility and sonorous voice, she immediately attracts attention. Her voice reactions are quite diverse. Some urges can be rendered as "qi-qi-fuit", "ping-ping-trrr" or "qiu-zizizizi". Most often, however, her sonorous "ping ... ping" is heard, just like a finch. On frosty days, up to 25-30 tits sometimes gather at the feeder. Here are old males with a very wide black stripe in the middle of the yellow bottom, and females, and young ones with a slightly noticeable "tie". Most willingly, tits peck at lard, cheese crusts and sunflower seeds. Each bird does not linger on the feeder for a long time: it will grab a seed, immediately fly off to the side and begin to peck, holding it in its paw.

Other species of tits: crested, puffy, chickadee, moskovka and blue tit - relatively rarely visit fodder tables. Of these, the blue tit is the most spectacular, especially on a sunny winter day, when the blue, yellow and white colors of its plumage are fully revealed. Moskovka is not found every year. In our area, it occurs in large quantities only in the years of harvest of spruce seeds. In size, the Muscovite is noticeably smaller than the great tit. Her head and neck are black, her chest and abdomen are whitish, her cheeks and the spot on the back of her head are white, the rest of the plumage is greenish-gray.

All tits are restless and do not stay long at the feeder. Very swift in movement and nuthatch. He suddenly appears at the feeder, hastily picking up several seeds at once, puts them in a row in his long beak and just as hastily flies away. A minute later, the nuthatch reappears and, again picking up seeds, is removed. As long as there is suitable food for him, he will carry it all the time and hide it in the crevices of trunks and under the bark of trees growing at a distance. These are his reserves, which the nuthatch stuffs into different places.

It's always nice to see a blackbird on the feeder. It is quite large, all black, with an orange beak. You can bait him with dried rowan and cottage cheese, and he will visit the feeder daily. In many areas blackbirds are now fairly common, but it is mostly the males that remain with us for the winter.

The great spotted woodpecker is also a decoration of the fodder table. In the forests, it feeds almost exclusively on pine seeds in winter. Here it eats all sorts of things, demonstrating its potential polyphagous. He willingly eats even pasta from soup. However, among the birds that fly to the feeders, the most omnivorous are the magpie and the jay. If they are not frightened, they are able to eat everything that was put in the feeder in one arrival. A more cautious jay pecks food faster than a magpie. With each sip, she arches her neck in a funny way and nods her head.

A group of granivorous birds visiting feeders behave differently. They crush the seeds, after cleaning them from inedible shells. This procedure takes time, and they sit on the feeder for a long time in relatively inactive positions, making quick peeling movements with their beak. The seed being processed is now on one side of the beak, then on the other, and it can be seen how the husk falls down. This is how, for example, greenfinches behave, which we recognize by their greenish-gray plumage and yellow stripes on the sides of the body, bunting, as well as tap and siskin, which visit feeders less often than other birds. For a long time it can "occupy" a fodder table and a flock of field sparrows, preventing even great tits from approaching it.

The degree of species diversity of birds visiting the feeding table largely depends on the composition of the feed offered to them. All kinds of leftovers from a human table: crumbs of cottage cheese, bread, rolls, cheese - attract house sparrows, great tits, jays, magpies, great spotted woodpeckers and some other birds. It is also good for jays to spread acorns. Sunflower seeds love the nuthatch. They are also the main food for great tits. On frosty days, the sunflower should be crushed with a bottle, as it is difficult for tits to hammer it. Their paws are cold, and they cannot grasp the seed tightly. For great tits, pieces of lard are also hung. Granivorous birds can be attracted with a mixture of hemp, millet, oats and oatmeal. It is very good to add seeds of nettle, quinoa, alder, pine and spruce, which sometimes can be prepared in advance. Then greenfinches, bullfinches, ordinary buntings, sometimes linnets, tap dances and siskins, as well as small types of tits - Muscovy, crested, fluffy, titmouse will appear on the feeders. In autumn, many bird lovers prepare rowan, elderberry, hawthorn berries for birds, which attract waxwings, schurov, and bullfinches. Berries are a favorite food for blackbirds as well. This handsome man is timid and cautious, and you need to look at him without waving your hands in delight.

This book should not be treated as a reference book in which you can find the answer to any question that arises on an ornithological excursion. You can always meet such birds and be a witness to such aspects of their life, which were not discussed in this book. Separate difficult-to-observe phenomena are not specially elucidated in it. In the same way, data on a number of bird species that are very rarely seen are deliberately omitted. The biology of even the most common birds is briefly described in "Ornithological Excursions". All this means that for successful birding it is necessary to read special literature. There are quite a few of them. The list attached to the book could include only a few works that are closest in subject matter.

Reading books, however, will never replace a personal experience with birds in nature. To understand the life of birds, it is necessary first of all. Only with experience comes the ability to notice the new, the still unknown. In this regard, ornithological excursions are fraught with unforeseen opportunities. We must always remember that in nature you can see more than what is said in any book.