Posted by barbarj1 (anonymous) on February 12, 2009 at 5:32 a.m. (Suggest removal)

I will say that it is something that my husband and I never did until we moved to the country. We have a very large screened porch that looks out over a large area of woods. We started noticing all the different kinds of birds. I bought a book on birds and we started looking up the different kinds we would see. I put out feeders and now there are so many. I have five hummingbird feeders in the yard and we love to just sit and watch them. They will come up to you and look you in the eye while you fill their feeders. It`s wonderful and calming.

Posted by silly_willy_24_7 (anonymous) on February 12, 2009 at 7:01 a.m. (Suggest removal)

i like to watch hummingbirds, too. them things are really mean when it comes to getting at the feeders. they will dive-bomb and knock another one out of the way, and then there are at least three fighting to get to the vacated spot. sugar water can get expensive, but the enjoyment of watching these little birds is worth it!!!

Posted by southernbelle (anonymous) on February 12, 2009 at 9:19 a.m. (Suggest removal)

I love watching birds around our feeders and on the creek behind our house. You'd be surprised at how many different varieties of birds we have coming through here. It's no wonder John James Audubon loved it here so much!

Posted by c_8512 (anonymous) on February 12, 2009 at 9:39 a.m. (Suggest removal)

J. J. Audubon never painted a bird he didn't kill to do it.

Posted by southernbelle (anonymous) on February 12, 2009 at 9:48 a.m. (Suggest removal)

I know,but they live on through his works. It was sad but necessary for the time he lived in.

Posted by whiterabbit (anonymous) on February 12, 2009 at 10:07 a.m. (Suggest removal)

It is not true that the "time he lived in" demanded that he kill the birds in order to draw them. Mark Catesby was drawing birds while they were alive in the early 1700s.

Posted by notfromnatchez (anonymous) on February 12, 2009 at 10:15 a.m. (Suggest removal)

Not at all...but I do love people watching.

Posted by crackbaby (anonymous) on February 12, 2009 at 4:56 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Who gives a hoot if Audubon killed a bird to draw it. Its just a bird!

Posted by Username (anonymous) on February 12, 2009 at 7:19 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Didn't Walter Anderson (great mississippi artist) capture birds and starve them and would study them until they decomposed, so that he could paint the birds from the inside out?

Posted by freedom42 (anonymous) on February 12, 2009 at 7:30 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Walter Anderson had a lot of mental problems, but I have never heard that about him. A lot of birds have been killed for less than the effort to paint them exactly as in nature.

Posted by Username (anonymous) on February 12, 2009 at 7:48 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Yes freedom 42 Walter Anderson did have some issues, I do remember that part correctly.
A friend took me to the museum about 20 years ago and I had never heard of the guy but my friend was studying him in a Ms collage at the time.
I was so facinated by the story of this guy and his works.
The muesem had a room of his house that he had painted the walls over and over and over and the final painting is the Mississippi river,I enjoyed it.

Posted by freedom42 (anonymous) on February 12, 2009 at 10:28 p.m. (Suggest removal)

Username, that brings up the question was he a great artist because of his mental problems? And if so, would he have been better or worse had he had access to todays drugs?
You know, better living through chemistry. I have never gotten to go to the museum, don't even know if it still there after Katrina?