Paul Ganssle @pganssle@qoto.org

Anyone know what kind of bird this is at my feeder?

Pictures don't really capture it well, but it's got some yellow-brown feathers on its back and head, very muted (I suspect this bird is a much brighter yellow during breeding season) a brown beak, white underbelly.

They seem to like thistle seeds.

#bird #birding

This account is basically now a birding account, sorry.

Two new birds at the feeder today (and yesterday): northern cardinal and an all-brown bird (or at least brown on the top parts, that I could see) with white-outlined wings. Not sure what that one was, none of the bird ID sites are showing me anything that looks exactly right.

For birds that molt, I do wish these bird ID sites would have a little table or breakdown. They have pictures labeled "nonbreeding male", but I'd really like it to say, "Between July and December males look like this, otherwise they look like this".

#birding

Customers today so far:

- Tufted titmouse
- White-breasted nuthatch
- European starling
- Black-capped chickadee
- Downy woodpecker
- Squirrel

Pictures are squirrel with tufted titmouse and tufted titmouse from yesterday.

#birding

Put up a bird feeder in the back yard last night, I've already seen three (non-squirrel) customers:

- Bluejay
- Downy woodpecker
- Black-capped chickadee

#birding

And here are two pictures of the (adult male, I think) white-breasted nuthatch I got through the binoculars this morning.

I am much more confident in this identification.

#birding

They seem like a good match for these photos taken recently in NYC: https://urbanhawks.blogs.com/urban_hawks/2020/09/black-throated-green-warbler.html

Here are some pictures of the yellow-headed warbler I saw yesterday (managed to snap a few not great pictures through the binoculars this morning).

I think they are black-throated green warblers, despite the fact that none of the ones I saw were actually black-throated.

#birding

I'm thinking maybe this one could work? https://www.amazon.com/Canon-EF-S-55-250mm-F4-5-6-Cameras/dp/B078GQTWFX

I'm not entirely sure how to translate the focal lengths of the lenses into an equivalent of my experience using binoculars. If I could get photos that were somewhat equivalent to what I see when I use my Athlon Midas ED 8x42 binoculars, I'd be very happy.

#birding #photography

Any #birding folks have suggestions on how to take pictures of distant birds without spending a huge amount on it?

Not looking to become a professional wildlife photographer, just to have some identifiable pictures of the birds I've seen.

I have a Canon T4i, but I'd probably be as happy or happier to just get a little clip-on telephoto lens for my phone if a decent one exists.

I think the warbler may have been a black-throated warbler, but I couldn't get a picture of it and I don't remember if it had the black throat.

It's been hanging around here for the past few days, so I hopefully I can catch it again.

Lots of birds in my backyard this morning:

- Pileated woodpecker
- Downy woodpecker
- Bluejay
- White-breasted nuthatch (?)
- Warbler with yellow head and back
- Some sort of hawk

#birding

Head's up: Major breaking change coming to tzlocal, as in the next version it will return zoneinfo time zones: https://github.com/regebro/tzlocal/pull/92

Anyone using `tzlocal` should test against master. If your application doesn't break, you are probably using tzlocal wrong anyway.

#python

Now I need to get a telephoto lens for my phone or camera, because I keep wanting to take pictures of the stuff I see in the binoculars.

Just got a pair of nice 8x42 binoculars (Athlon Midas ED) and #protip: they make #birding so much better.

I don't know why no one thought to use these to look at birds before I came up with this wholly original idea.

Tip: On Cinnamon (and probably other Window managers and OSes), Alt + ~ is the same as Alt + Tab, but restricted to the currently active application (e.g. tab between Firefox windows).

Learned this from @LarryHastings@twitter.com last year and I've probably used it every day.

Having a pulse oximeter is kinda fun, though it's disconcerting that the pulse number starts blinking when it falls under 60 bpm, considering my normal HR is usually something around 50 bpm.

Context here is #python, if that wasn't clear.

If you wanted to write a conditional to check whether both a and b are None or neither are None, would you use comparison chaining for either condition, both conditions, or neither?

Chaining:

if a is b is None:
…
if a is not None is not b:
…

Non-chaining:

if a is None and b is None:
…
if a is not None and b is not None:
…