They're Out There. They're Watching You. Silently...

There are probably thirty birds in this tree...

Do you ever get the eerie feeling that you are being watched? I get it sometimes, and I'll look around and not see anything. At first. Can you see them? It's not the black things, those are old leaves. Or in the picture below. Can you see them?

And probably more than a hundred in these trees.

They can see you...they're watching you...

Cedar Waxwings (Bombycilla cedrorum) are sweet little birds who grace my neighborhood only a few days or weeks at most out of the year. They're colorful and quiet and beautiful. But sometimes they freak me out just a little bit.

And more than a dozen here...

At sunset the other evening I really did feel like something was watching me as I got out of my car in my own driveway. I looked around and finally looked up into the flowering pear tree on our front lawn, and they were there. Dozens of them, none of them making a sound. I thought it was just a little eerie, like the birds in the movie "Birds". But really, they were just sleeping for all I could tell.

At least you can see these individuals. And they see you.

And then this afternoon I was walking and looking for birds, but somehow I just didn't see that they were filling a tree right in front of me. At least until the tree seemed to explode and fifty or sixty of them flew across the yard to another tree.

In any case, the Cedar Waxwings are back in the neighborhood for a few days, and I'm always happy to see them. I'm pleased that they like our pear tree so much that they'll spend a few nights there, creepy silence or not.

They may just be the most colorful bird found around these parts.

 You just have to try and not let that stare get to you...really, they're probably just sleeping...