More Christmas birds

A few more birds from this past week. First, a bird on wire ... a male eastern bluebird, to be exact.

Next, a mockingbird in the Japanese maple

A slightly blurry blue jay

A white-throated sparrow, down from Canada, in the maple with the lights

A female northern cardinal, photobombing the bird in the background...

... this lovely female rufous-sided towhee

Here's her mate, who's less inclined to stay when he spots a person

Buzzards (vultures, for the purists - mostly turkey but probably one or two black as well) on the cell-phone tower

And finally, from a mixed flock of small birds (titmice, chickadees, and nuthatches) that comes through the back trees nearly every morning, first a tufted titmouse ...

... and then a black-capped chickadee (or maybe a Carolina one) from the previous day, when it was raining.