I spent the entire day Friday shooting up in Madera Canyon across from the Santa Rita Lodge, one of Southeastern Arizona's birding hotspots; my host for this great photo op was again Bill from The Pond at Elephant Head. Two woodpecker species were among the regular visitors to the feeding stations. The Acorn Woodpeckers would eat anything and everything, it seemed, including suet, seeds, nuts, and mealworms, while the Arizona Woodpeckers
fed exclusively on suet. The Acorn Woodpeckers also seemed to have an extremely low level of tolerance for the gang of Mexican Jays that came around and would chase them off most of the time.

The attraction to Madera Canyon is the opportunity to see birds that barely range into the U.S. from Mexico and Central America. The Hepatic Tanager is a little more widespread than some of the others but seeing one was still a treat. The Arizona Woodpecker is one of those species but the bird that really grabbed my attention - oh, do I wish I had some shots to share but it got a little to drink and was gone - was the Painted Redstart. What a beauty! Other birds that were regular visitors included Bridled Titmouse (another AZ specialty), Lesser Goldfinch, White-breasted Nuthatch, and, foraging on the ground, Chipping Sparrows.

Late in the afternoon this uninvited guessed caused the avian activity to all but come to a stop. From the looks of it, Coatimundi's apparently have a taste for sunflower seeds. A relative of the Raccoon, it didn't seem to bothered by people and just kept on eating even though I tried to chase it off.

A couple of interesting experiences while I was in the blind: About midway through my morning session I had titmouse land for a few seconds on the end of my lens hood, look right at me, then flew over to the feeder. A little later the Bewick's Wren that was foraging on the ground with the Chipping Sparrow's actually came in the open rear "door" of the blind and hopped around for a minute looking for food.