Lazy Sunday

Today we went to a book release signing party. The much awaited, Birds of Hocking County, Ohio was written by a colleagues/friends and we were excited to support their endeavor. We then came home to get the pups out for their nightly exercise and played in the yard.  You can most likely find us in the yard anytime the weather is decent and we are free.

Black Throated Green Warbler

Black-throated green warbler in our yard. All the time that Andrew has spent on NWF certified wildlife habitat is paying off.

Bluebirds

This has been the coldest winter in Central Ohio in recent memory.  We've been keeping the backyard bird feeders filled and have been rewarded by the appearance of many species of winter birds.  The bluebirds are my favorites and over the weekend we had three pairs at the feeder at one time.  Andrew got some wonderful photos.

Summer Yard

Our yard looks better this year than it ever has. Fifteen years in the making we've finally got the landscaping the way we envisioned it back when we bought the house. Also this year a much awaited addition was the appearance of Royal Catch Fly- Andrew planted some seeds several years ago and we had pretty much forgotten about them.  We also added a memorial garden for our departed rabbit friends,  a tiny yellow rose bush that my aunt Patty started off of a cutting from my grandma's yellow rose bush, and a mister, feeder and bird bath for hummingbirds. The rain this year has really helped things along. We've had a variety of birds visiting both baths and our feeders. We also have squirrels, chipmunks, opossums, raccoons, and a pair of red shouldered hawks who stopped by one afternoon while they were house and of course Pip and her various suitors.

 

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Something Suspect

Remember the post I made earlier in the week about the cute Chipping Sparrow family?  Andrew and I both initially thought the baby bird closest to the lens was huge and odd looking. I wanted to investigate further but he was afraid the babies would fledge prematurely or us messing around with the nest would attract a predator.  The doubt about this bird not looking like its parents nagged at us all week and we both should know better. The day after I photographed the chipping sparrows I came home from work at lunch and there was a baby bird on the porch near the chipping sparrow nest.  I picked it up and looked at it and just as I decided that it was a baby robin and not a chipping sparrow momma robin with worm in tow dived bombed me from afar and confirmed my identification. I thought maybe there was a chipping sparrow nest and a robin nest in the same vicinity and that we had gotten into the robin nest, henceforth the bigger baby but that didn't make sense either due to the location of the nest in a bush. Anyway that night we got out the bird id book and looked at those baby chipping sparrows again as Andrew had doubts and swore that one was a cowbird baby.  Ok for the record I have never seen one single cowbird in this yard E-V-E-R.  This evening there was another baby bird on the ground and I was able to get a picture of it.  It was a babycow bird and guess what else?  Along came momma chipping sparrow who landed on the branch next to it and I actually saw her feed it a worm!! Crap!!  I hate that.  And I missed out on the photo of a life time of this tiny mother bird feeding this huge beast baby bird as the auto focus on my Nikon lagged and I missed the shot.

Chipping Sparrows

We've got a family of chipping sparrows in our boxwood bush near the front porch. They are the cutest little birds...

Luxury Nests

The baby goldfinches in our yard will have posh nests this spring. I gave Andrew a bunch of my shorter angora fiber that I took off my french angoras this spring and he put it in a dispenser for the birds.  Two pairs of goldfinches were busy yesterday gathering up fiber for their nest. One of them got so exuberant that she was covered with the stuff.  It was so much fun to watch and they seemed  delighted and almost playful as they flew back and forth all day collecting their treasure.

Discovering the fiber

Off with the first batch

 Getting pretty exuberant with the "harvest"

 The male "supervising"

 Picking up another batch

This is mine! Go find your own!!!

A Glimpse of Spring

Ok so there wasn't a whole lot going on at the creek last Saturday that was outwardly visible but we put the canoe in anyway hoping to be rewarded for our efforts. The sun was shining but the water was freezing. We both wore waders on this trip as the water was too high for just knee boots. We did manage to scare up a few signs of spring and had a nice day out.  We saw some wood ducks, mergansers, and mallards as well as a great blue heron and a couple fox squirrels and one huge tree that the beavers were working on sending into the creek. 

 This is one of Andrew's colleagues seine nets that we found tangled up on some brush in the creek. Andrew recognized it because he repaired a hole that was in it with some zip ties. (-:

Green sided darter

 This is a dragonfly nymph called a Dragonhunter. This species is the largest dragonfly in Ohio and an uncommon species that is also a clean water indicator.

 Found treasures

The  Blue Heron that stayed just ahead of us on the creek almost the entire way.

Snow Trillium. A rare species found only a couple places in the state of Ohio.

Beaver tree aka cottonwood

Bluebird Update

We've got bluebirds!  They have been around for a couple weeks now so we hope they are going to nest. DH built them a box and they love the meal worms we are providing for them.  I'll keep you posted.