Brown Thrashers in our Garden!

'plant a seed, plant a seed, bury it, bury it, cover it up, cover it up, let it grow, let it grow, dig it up, dig it up, eat it, eat it' goes the song of the brown thrasher. 

A member of the mockingbird family, famous for their intricate songs, the thrasher repeats all his song phrases twice.  Meanwhile, when not singing, the pair make a 'chuck' call.  This pair is sharing the summer with us, nesting in the garden, and easy to see.  

described as looking "rather severe" due to shape of
the eye and the beak, this one certainly meets that
description!

Brown Thrashers spend most of their time near or on the ground, walking, running, or hopping. When disturbed at the nest, they drop to the ground and dart into dense cover. They feed by sweeping their long bills through leaf litter to uncover insects and other invertebrates. They are slow, short-distance fliers with a distinctive jerky, fluttering flight style. They breed in such dense vegetation that little is known of their courtship; the few observations that exist suggest that a courting pair presents each other with twigs or dead leaves, after which the male may briefly chase the female before mating 

They defend territories of variable size, and they are very aggressive toward intruding Brown Thrashers and toward potential nest predators, which include snakes  and dogs. Sometimes Brown Thrashers strike predators with their bills hard enough to draw blood.

Along with our swallows, swarming the air and gobbling up mosquitoes, and our elusive but lovely bluebird, and the even more elusive wren, a walk along our garden fence will always provide lots of bird sightings.