UPDATE:
Thanks to Eugene, Avilay and Sally for sending in the bird IDs comments, you have been very kind in not telling us that we don't know jack about our birdies 😅 We updated the post with their corrections and added a few pieces additional piece of information.
Just like a kid walking into a candy shop, I stroll around and find things that for who was born here is normal and for us is more like "hey honey look" "a beautiful rock!". Yep, we're at that stage.
Mario often reminds me:
[...] don't take anything for granted, even the silliest things; because the things that make your life better are the things that you less see. Like oxygen or me...
Besides the last plug, he puts in every drop of wisdom 😄 he's right.
As part of learning from that wisdom, I have been tracking the birds in our backyard, and here is what I found so far. I will keep the post up to date as we discover more species.
I don't know anything about birds, that's probably why I tweet every blue-moon 😆 but I appreciate the beauty and good bird peace environments. Well... besides when I am trying to fall asleep and they chirp away!
Bird One
That is until thanks to the power of my Google guy I found out the actual species' name of this cutie. The scientific name according to this amazing and complicated bird library is Hemignathus wilsoni. For the rest of us humans, it's called Hawaiʻi ʻamakihi.
It is a small bird, it is yellow-green with a small black bill that is 1.3 centimeters (0.51 in) long and has brown eyes with black pupils. If you want to see it in action and hearing it chirping, have a watch.
If you want to take a much closer look, here it is me, playing snow-white on our porch late at night.
amokihi does show up in our mango trees but as it turns out, thanks to Eugene, the one Vickie is holding is not. It's actually a Warbling white-eye. Avilay also agrees so we definitely are blind and decrepit.
We were trying to figure out the overcomplicated assembly of a cargo carrier we bought for the blue torpedo when Mario rescued it from Scarlet.
She aims at lizards and birds like Tom Cat (Jerry) in the cartoon. Fortunately with the same killing success rate of the famous animation, with the exception of mice where she's doing an excellent job! Good job Doggie!
TheyGreen as Mario nicknamed the BirdOne until I find an actual BETTER (tsk tsk) name for the new family member. When I asked why this name, his answer was:
we don't know the gender but we know it's green. "They" is the pronoun used for when you are neither genders and "it" is offensive, we don't call Scarlet "it" but "she" so... Facts are facts. Green Arrow would also be a good one but I just bot a bow, so there's that.
Politically correct bird knowledge... Why I even asked, I wonder.
Anyway, the day after we rescued THAT bird, the next day Scarlet brought in the living room another one but much-much smaller. That's when mama instinct kicked in and I had to do something.
A week before this event, we were doing a massive clean up across the property, and we found a nest (unknown species at moment) with one egg inside (🥺 & 🤩) Tapping into my vending machine idea man on what to do, I was directed to a box that I could have made in a temporary protective cage until we order something less Macgyver and more weatherproof.
Bird Two
About a month ago Mario was on the phone with Ghost Rider (Cristiano) while they were chatting as usual, like two birds in love (all puns intended) Mario spotted a birdie by our mango tree and start taking pictures in multitasking mode.
When I asked for the pictures, I asked if this was going to be called TheyRed and he angrily answered: NO.
He's always very tone relaxed hearing that tone was clearly a sign of some hidden story... so I asked what's up, the bird pooped on you?
His name is fuckerRed. It has been piercing the smaller mangos and trenching the bigger ones. That's my breakfast! And he is not pitching in for water either so... there's that.
I noticed that he said "HE" and I asked how he knew that the bird was a boy.
If it was a girl, she would wait for me to ask her out, offered the entire tree, pretending to pay when the bill shows up, and left me hanging on the porch with a tweet. This fucker doesn't even chirp, just eats my mangos. He's lucky that he's scrawny or lunch would be red tainted.
Clearly, there are some unresolved issues between him and the birdie I rather don't step in. But he's right on something, he's a fucker!
That screwing flock of feathers is a songbird and according to Wikipedia
A songbird is a bird belonging to the clade Passeri of the perching birds. Another name that is sometimes seen as the scientific or vernacular name is Oscines, from Latin oscen, "a songbird"
It's a Northen Cardinal as Eugene explained (his wife is a birder) when they are young their beak is whiter and it can be mistaken for what we thought it was a Red Factor, which according to our birds sources now, they don't live in Hawaii.
Bird Three
I have seen several around 9:30 AM of those little gems around the property, Red Crest Cardinals, they don't have a very churchy look but they are very pretty!
My friend Iwona, while I am editing this, is visiting Honolulu and posted this photo she took of this little guy.
The Cardinal has an interesting tweeting tune.
Bird Four
It is brown when it glides around has half a moon white strip that goes from the ends of the wings to the tail. What a bird has no clue and since I don't have a picture of it, yet, I don't know either... If you know do let me know!
Avilay and Eugene agree on the ID of this one is Common myna we haven't managed to get a picture of our own yet but the one that Wikipedia shows is definitely it.
Bird Five
This is on Mario's most wanted list. He starts working at 6 AM due to the timezones of his team at work and this little guy punctually, five minutes after his meeting starts and when his microphone is fully opened, starts chirping with a rhythm that almost looks like an Italian comedy gig of the 80s!
We know that between 7:02 and 7:11 AM he sings for a few moments, we have been trying to record it but unfortunately, the audio has the background of Mario's colleagues in the back and that can't be shared but we will catch the little rascal's sound for sure!
Surprisingly enough is a blue-collar bird worker, because he does that sound Monday to Friday!
Sally gave us a clue of who is the loud birder that
The loud bird is a type of Francolin that locals brought in.. [...] loud birds, but they love centipedes.
Given how scary looking are to us the cetipedes, this loud bird is now mostly welcome!
Bird Six
We haven't seen it but an app that we used to track the sounds tells us that it is an Olomaʻo which, sounds wise is our most favorite. Maui is only 9 miles away from our home and they appear to be traveling from there in the morning. At least that is what the bird's Internet vernacular claims... again I don't know jack about birdies.
Our friend Tanya (the birder!) is an avid photographer and she takes great pictures
of the wildness. In particular of her favorite bird: OWLS! I have seen one but it was too dark for the phone to do anything that was more than a blob.
She also grew this flower, so Eugene take her here either for photo taking or the gardening, I will take either or both 😈 no questions asked!
I will pay her back in kind 😅 and the beach is just 6 miles away. I mean what else do you need ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
That's my bird adventure, I will keep you posted on Instagram on the TheyGreen evolution, we're also working on a birdbath thingy (dunno what to call it) when the project is done I will post about it, we're waiting for some deco materials to arrive.
There's an app Merlin that according to Eugene and Avilay does wonder in bird IDs, we downloaded it and will let you know if works for us too. If not, Mario just got his bow, so birdies out there that disturb the peace too early in the morning, be warned!
V, out. Don't rush! It's Moloka'i bLife time. 🤙🏽
