I have been walking, walking, walking through the past ten months (!) of Covid, and perhaps you have, too. Walking to get out of the house, walking to get exercise, to get out of the chairs we sit in all day, to deal with stress, with boredom, and to see something new or at least …
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Notes from a wildlife-friendly cottage garden
This is the second year in a row we’ve been visited by a pair of Scarlet Tanagers. Yay!
We have an amazing Tulip post coming, but I’m not posting it until Wednesday because 1) Judy took so many beautiful pictures of Tulips that even after I whittled them down, there were still almost 50 which is too many, so I need to work some more on photo elimination; and 2) we have bird …
We see hawks in the back garden, but usually they are perched on a distant branch, or sometimes they come swiftly gliding through, hoping to snatch some unfortunate smaller bird.
Scarlet Tanager, I Presume
This past weekend a pair of Scarlet Tanagers visited the back garden. Like the Indigo Bunting, this is a bird that we see only once every year or so.
From One Mother to Another
I don’t believe in coincidences. It cannot be just chance that so many of our best backyard bird sightings happen on or the day before Mother’s Day. I’m convinced that these rare appearances are a gift from one mother to another, namely from Mother Nature to Judy.
The Great Backyard Bird Count, 2019
The Great Backyard Bird Count was held February 15-18th, and as usual Judy and I were happy to participate. All you have to do is choose a spot and spend a few minutes or a couple of hours counting birds.
Hummingbird Wars
A few days ago there was a short but eye-opening New York Times article concerning recent research on hummingbirds. The research indicates that Hummingbird beaks evolved primarily for fighting, not for feeding.
Birds, Butterflies, and Bison at the Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie
An hour’s drive southwest of Chicago is an 18,000-acre prairie preserve called Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie (pronounced Mi-DAY-win). The preserve was created mostly out of lands that had belonged to the now-closed Joliet Army Ammunition Plant. Today the land is part of the U.S. Forest Service and is operated in partnership with the The Nature …
Baby House Wrens!
We’re home! Judy and I got home just last night from the Upper Peninsula. There are a lot of developments in the garden, almost all positive, which I’ll get to soon. However, we’ve spent much of today doting over the baby House Wrens in the yellow birdhouse right outside our back porch.
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