Reclusive, secretive and ground-dwelling can all be used to describe the brown thrasher, this week’s featured creature. I am revisiting these birds as I've had the pleasure of seeing them quite ...

Brown thrashers nest throughout the East and Midwest, including all of North Carolina. Northern birds generally migrate to the southeastern states for the cold months.

Nesting habits: The thrasher builds a large nest in thick shrubs, often those with thorns. It's usually no more than 14 feet above the ground and often lower.

The brown thrasher (Toxostoma rufum) is the state bird of Georgia, but they nest in my garden year after year and why wouldn’t they – there are birdbaths in every port, lots of shrubs for them ...

Many Columbians will get a glimpse of a brown thrasher this summer and will assume it is a female cardinal as it darts into shrubs and disappears into the foliage. The silhouettes are somewhat ...

• Brown thrasher: Nest composed of twigs, dead leaves and other vegetation; may be in dense bush or thorny shrub or on ground.

The nestling cowbirds –usually one per nest — compete with the baby thrashers for food and nest space. Unable to tell the orphan from their own young, adult thrashers feed the gaping mouths of ...

Like numerous other bird lovers in spring and summer, I delight in watching our songbirds — cardinals, bluebirds, blue jays, brown thrashers — as they go about building nests, incubating eggs ...

For those not familiar with brown thrashers — relatives of the Northern mockingbird — they are known for their feisty and fearless protection of their nest and young.

Note: Bird sightings return on July 11. The Brown Thrasher is an actor, robed in reddish hue, not in the distinguished gray like the catbird or the mockingbird. As noted in Chris Leahy’s ...

Brown thrashers defend their nest. They have been known to draw blood attacking humans and dogs which approach the nest. (Journal photo by Larry Myhre) ...