A favorite bird of mine........

I really didn't give House Finches much thought, they were not a favored bird of mine until this past summer. We had a little male House Finch that started showing up on the deck that had the disease that's common to the House Finch. The poor little guy could hardly see out of his crusted over eyes. He did all he could to fly from a nearby tree to the deck for his sunflower seeds. He would hover over the deck rail unsure it was under him. Most of the time he'd make it, sometimes he wouldn't. It was so sad to watch.

At one point we set out a dish on the rail just for him. Of course other birds found it, but he knew where it was and that was his favorite dish to eat out of. He always wanted something to drink when he visited the deck, so we always set his dish close to the water so all he needed to do was turn around and hop about three times to get to the water. With his trouble seeing, when it came time for a drink of water he'd stretch his neck high as if looking for some distant object. After searching for a short time he'd get an idea of direction and hop over to the water with his head still held high straining to find his way. The little guy would get his drink and with much effort fly to the nearest tree and with a rather rough landing find his evening perch.  His course of habit was to feed just as the sun was setting. And most all the time, when he found his eventing perch he would face the setting sun just as in the photo above. Many times we'd watch where he settled in for the evening  and the next morning we would get up to see if he was still there and many times he was.

One fall day we had a storm, a big storm with sustained winds of 25 mph and gusts of wind at 40mph. I knew the night I heard the details of the next days storm, we would never see our little friend again. I imagined him trying to reach the deck with those kind of winds only to be blown way off course and with his poor eyesight would probably be unable to find his way back to our deck. Well, my fear turned into reality. After the storm we never saw our little friend again.

How strange I should invest so much time and emotion in this little sick bird. But I did. Through it I gained a whole new appreciation for House Finches. They are now a favored bird thanks to that little sick fellow.