Over the past month, I’ve taken delight at watching the goldfinches transform into their Spring – Summer – Fall wardrobe. This first video was taken about 10 days ago—
Goldfinches March 26, 2025
Here’s the activity and appearance today. It might be cloudy, but the goldfinches’ color compensate for the drab day—
Last year, specifically November 30th, 2023, while bicycling on the Schuylkill River Trail, we noticed several tropical parakeets in the vicinity of the old railroad bridge just west of the Norristown Train Station. I never posted the sighting, because I couldn’t get a good picture, but this is what I had captured on my iPhone at the time last year—
November 30 2023 along the Schuylkill River Trail (converted old railroad bridge of the trail just west of the Norristown Train Station)
We were biking again this past week, and incredibly, we saw another parakeet in the same general vicinity of the last sightings, just a bit further west along the trail—
Tuesday, Sept 24th 2024, slightly further west from the converted train bridge on the Schuylkill River Trail
Here is a video of the same sighting this week—
Tuesday, Sept 24th 2024, slightly further west from the converted train bridge on the Schuylkill River Trail
I bike on the trail quite a bit. This is the second year seeing parakeet(s) in the Fall, on this trail. I haven’t noticed these birds any other times of the year.
Perhaps we’re seeing a trend that has occurred in cities in Europe. Check thisstoryout. And this story says that escaped pet parakeets have naturalized in many cities in the US. Who knew?
About one half hour before sunset, if I’m home, I like to treat the cardinals in my neck of the woods to safflower seed. Anticipating the ‘feast’, they line up in the trees, waiting for me to put clumps of seeds on the railings of our deck.
While not able to capture on camera the shear large number of birds that come out for the occasion, today I counted about 15 taking part.
I call it a meeting of the “College of Cardinals”. It’s interesting— the male cardinals take over first and then the females come by to eat afterwards.
“The College of Cardinals”Northern Cardinals as seen from our window