Comments on Birdchick Blog: It Was About Quality, Not Quantity

Looks like those who guessed the invasive honeysuc...

2008-09-29T18:53:00.000-05:00

Looks like those who guessed the invasive honeysuckle were right. I just got this in email:

"In regards to your horticulture question, I asked a good friend at Harvard's Arnold Arboretum, 'what is is this green thing with the red berries?'

Her response was "Tatarian honeysuckle (Lonicera tatarica), a fairly invasive non-native species." Her name is Nancy Rose, and she edits the Arnoldia, at Harvard."

Curt

Your shrubbery is Tatarian honeysuckle (Lonicera t...

2008-09-28T21:01:00.000-05:00

Your shrubbery is Tatarian honeysuckle (Lonicera tatarica), a fairly invasive non-native species.

I'm also LOLing at the "elder hostile" thing. Look...

2008-09-25T08:44:00.000-05:00

I'm also LOLing at the "elder hostile" thing. Look out for those angry olds!

What an amazing experience (despite the self-heating coffee from the above PSA--blech!). You're one hard-workin' birdchick!

Those photos took my breath away.

2008-09-24T13:13:00.000-05:00

Those photos took my breath away.

Craig - -Good catch! I'm laughing so hard that I'...

2008-09-24T10:07:00.000-05:00

Craig - -

Good catch! I'm laughing so hard that I'm just gonna leave it that way. For the record, they were an Elder Hostel not elder hostiles.

Liz--

I think you nailed it with the amur honeysuckle. Thanks!!

How about this?http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chokec...

2008-09-24T09:15:00.000-05:00

How about this?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chokecherry
I'm guessing this is a more probable candidate.

That young peregrine falcon is beautiful!For the p...

2008-09-24T09:11:00.000-05:00

That young peregrine falcon is beautiful!
For the plant-- it certainly could be honeysuckle, though usually birds don't seem to start on them right away if they have other options, which makes me wonder. Also, the shape of the berries isn't quite right, though maybe what I'm seeing there is just berries that have been broken open by birds. Here's an image of some Amur honeysuckle(sorry about the ugly url-- wasn't sure if I could do hyperlinks in comments): http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://naturematters.files.wordpress.com/2007/03/amur6a.jpg&imgrefurl=http://naturematters.wordpress.com/2006/&h=1373&w=1830&sz=166&hl=en&start=13&um=1&usg=__uGlB6bKho_vUeauQCvC1fiWdUmU=&tbnid=3pZJ__4NhqjuzM:&tbnh=113&tbnw=150&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dhoneysuckle%2Bberries%2Bbranches%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26sa%3DN.

We have a lot of this variety in my area, and usually the berries are intact long into the winter. Maybe you have a tastier variety in Minnesota? The leaves do look like they could be in the honeysuckle family...

Slight editorial comment. I assume that instead o...

2008-09-24T08:43:00.000-05:00

Slight editorial comment. I assume that instead of "an elder hostile showed up" you mean "members of an elder HOSTEL showed up".

I have this mental image of a dozen geriatrics charging across the field at your blind, waving shotguns and yelling "Get off our lawn!". :-) Too funny.

This sounds like fun. As I've said before, your stories make me think that if I wasn't already overloaded with expensive and time-consuming hobbies, birding might be something I'd engage in from time to time.