The Flyer by Flying Colors

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Volume 15 • April 29, 2022

Welcome to 
🦜 The Flyer 🦜
by Flying Colors


Happy weekend! Each Friday we share original content written by the Flying Colors team, fascinating stories & tidbits from the world of birding, curated products, epic bird photos, and more. ✨

If you'd rather view this newsletter in your web browser, click here.

Birding from bed?

Have you ever gone birding from bed? (via @anna_krayons)

Bird of the Week: The American Osprey

The Guam Rail

Photo by Mathew Schwartz (Unsplash)

Found on every continent except Antarctica

If you’re hanging out near the water in much of the world, you just might see an Osprey soaring nearby. This yellow-eyed raptor—recognizable by its white head and belly and m-shaped wingspan—is a pescatarian and expert diver, snatching fish from the water with its sharpened claws. (They only have to hunt for an average of 12 minutes before they catch their prey.) Their bleating, rhythmic calls are reminiscent of those of seagulls. They are also big migrators; An Osprey may travel more than 160,000 miles during its 15-to-20-year lifetime. 

Osprey nests can be easy to spot as they’re large and built with sticks on high points such as channel markers, utility poles, and rock formations. Nesting pairs can return to the same nest year after year. And you might just attract a nesting pair to your home if you set up a nesting perch large and high enough. 

Fun fact: Bald Eagles will sometimes chase Ospreys down so they drop their recent catch—and the Eagle gets a free meal.

Give a Hoot

Birding bits you should know about this week

🍎Empire State of mind
How to start birding in the Big Apple
Rochelle Thomas, president of the Linnaean Society of New York, talks about what makes birding in NYC so special, her “spark bird,” and has a simple answer for why people are so fascinated by birds: “They can fly.”

😎 The kids are alright
A wander on the wildside
British teen birder Arjun Dutta, who is one of the subjects of the new documentary Skyward, writes his own birding and photography blog! You can read about his birding adventures (he recently wrote up their 2021 trip to Shropshire and Wales where he photographed the Arctic Tern) or follow his Twitter. 

🧳 Winding roads
The paths we take
Stories of how migration links both humans and birds from Audubon magazine

🌟 True north
The miracle of bird migration in Santa Barbara
A look at the birds (like the Hooded Oriole and Warbling Vireos) arriving to California from Mexico in spring and summer, and the evolution of our understanding of bird migration

🐦 Put a bird on it!
“I could’ve totally mounted a camera next to a five-dollar birdfeeder but that’s so boring!”
Check out how this guy made his own 3D-printed camera birdfeeder!

A Product We Love

Unique and worthy products from the wide world of birding you might enjoy

Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott. While this book is not really about birds, it’s still a classic we love about writing, creativity, and living well. Lamott’s heartfelt advice can be summed up by three little words: take life “bird by bird.” $16

Searching for a Great Mother's Day Gift?Here's $5 Off

$5 Off The Jar for Mother's Day

Give a Mom in your life (or anyone else!) a taste of our premium organic wild bird food in a beautiful (and reusable) glass jar, the perfect gift for every aspiring birder.

Choose from three custom blends — all made with 100% USDA certified organic ingredients and hand-mixed with love in New York's Hudson Valley. Pacakged in a beautiful (and reusable) glass jar, it's shipped to any address in the United States free of charge!

As a subscriber to The Flyer, you can get $5 off any Jar... just use the coupon code MOMSJAR at checkout. And get an additional 10% off if you subscribe — cancel anytime! Offer ends May 13, 2022.

SHOP NOW AND SAVE $5

Your Shot

An amazing bird photo taken by one of our community members. Submit yours to hello@flyingcolors.co to be considered for an upcoming edition!

Downy Woodpecker

via @marktakesphoto on Twitter

“Thirty years ago my older brother, who was ten years old at the time, was trying to get a report on birds written that he’d had three months to write. It was due the next day. We were out at our family cabin in Bolinas, and he was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder paper and pencils and unopened books on birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead. Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother’s shoulder, and said, ‘Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.’”

–Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird

Thank you for being part of our flock! Be sure to follow us on Instagram, and if a friend forwarded you this email, you can subscribe here & view our archive.

Questions? Ideas? Epic bird photos? Reach out at hello@flyingcolors.co

The Flyer by Flying Colors

About Us

Flying Colors makes premium organic wild bird food, offering ethically sourced, toxin-free seeds and nuts of the highest quality to nourish wild birds of all types and inspire birders of all ages. Each specialty blend and single origin creation is rigorously sourced & researched, and every jar is produced with love & packaged by hand in small batches in New York's Hudson Valley and tested in our own backyards.

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Flying Colors 84 Central Ave Tarrytown, New York 10591