There is one place in Utah where I have without fail always seen at least one Black-billed Magpie: Red Butte Garden.
They like the trees and I think they prefer the higher elevations.
In the past week, the magpies have been hanging out in my neighborhood. This guy was peeling the pain off of my neighbor’s garage.
I don’t really understand why he wants paint when the neighborhood is filled with feeders.
The rest of the magpies were enjoying my feeders. I didn’t get a picture, but one magpie was trying to eat seed from feeders designed for finches. It wasn’t working except as a way to swing seed out of the feeder.
These guys were looking pretty rough. The one in the upper right-hand corner is missing a lot of feathers around his face and the one in the picture above that is missing feathers on his breast. There were a lot more than what you see in the picture. At one point I counted 18!
A lot of people don’t like magpies because they’re bullies. They’re crazy little buggers that mess with your stuff and kick out all the other birds. In this situation it wasn’t a great loss because they were merely preventing the starlings from eating.
I love these photos! Such pretty colors on them and you can see the attitude. Thanks for posting!
Thanks! They’re gorgeous birds.
I love these photos too – gorgeous birds! I’ve only ever seen a single magpie, once, from a distance; it’s stunning to see them flocking. Except for the weird paint chip eater; he has some issues.
It was very exciting. I had to stay home to have some blinds installed and they all showed up around 10:00 am. It made me want to work from home because of all the fun I’m missing.