By Aaron Horrell

Many of us look upon winter as a time when nature is drab and unexciting. Of course, snow brings its own kind of beauty, but this winter in Southeast Missouri has brought very little snow so far.

You can draw some winter color to your yard if you put out a bird feeder and keep it filled with sunflower seeds.

Shown here are four different kinds of colorful birds that stay during winter in our part of the world.

The red male cardinal is easily identified. Above the cardinal, a female house finch is about to land. Closest to the cardinal is a pine siskin. To the right of the siskin is an American goldfinch, and just above, with its head reaching in the feeder, is another American goldfinch.

As I watched this bird feeder, I saw several other kinds of birds come to get sunflower seeds. There were Carolina chickadees, titmice, white-breasted nuthatches, Carolina wrens, blue jays, eastern towhees and woodpeckers. The thick fog did not keep the birds away. Instead, it seemed to make them more eager to come and eat.

Early morning and late evening are the times you can expect songbirds to be most active at your feeder. They will be hungry after a long, cold night, and an evening feeding will help keep them warm until morning.

I find it useless to try to keep gray squirrels away from a bird feeder. It is best to sprinkle whole-kernel corn on the ground for the squirrels, rabbits and mourning doves.