Warm Weather!

 The rain has stopped! At least for now. Today was warm and sunny. The last several days have been dry, if not warm. But there is still plenty of snow we can see on the hills south of us. I even mowed the lawn... it was very high. The tulips are finally unfurling but I have yet to take flower photos. Instead I've been taking bird photos, now that I've regained some of the energy that disappeared while I was sick.

Every morning while milking and feeding goats, I watch and listen for birds outside the barn... well, sometimes inside now that the Barn Swallows are back. I keep lists in my little Rite in the Rain notebook, then transfer that data to e-bird under their "incidental" category... meaning I'm not just watching birds. I'm doing something else (milking goats) and just note whatever birds I happen to see/hear.

For the last two days, e-bird (a Cornell Ornithology site that birders across the nation use) has been insisting that the Fox Sparrow I list cannot be because it would be rare here at this time of year. In a normal year, the Fox Sparrows (we had three of them here all winter) would have left by now for their northern breeding territories. Two of them have. But one is still hanging out, eating the seed I throw in front of the barn every morning.

So yesterday afternoon, I went back out with my camera and took photos of the "rare" Fox Sparrow. And, while I was at it, any other bird that would hold still. We have 4 swallow species working on nests here. 

Our daily "Rare" Fox Sparrow:

 "Our" swallows:

 

Cliff Swallows working on mud nest

 

Barn Swallow

 

Tree Swallow

 

Violet-green Swallow

 And just in case e-bird decides all these Golden-crowned Sparrows we have should have moved north to nest by now, I took a photo of one of them... This one may have some White-crowned Sparrow in its genes since the back half of it's head stripe is white instead of gold.

 

 Here is a bonafide White-crowned Sparrow

 

 It was 80 here today, but I was at the cool beach doing my Beached Bird Survey for April. This Killdeer was perfectly happy to pose for as many photos as I wanted to take. I don't think I've ever seen a Killdeer on the beach before.

 

 Life is good again. Flowers are blooming, birds are singing. Happy Spring at last!

 

 

 

 

 

Hard Times on the Farm

 Into every life a little rain must fall. So said my mother. She also said "This, too, shall pass." Okay, I'm ready for the rain to pass, also the sadness and sickness. Friends have died. Goats have died. Johnny and I both got some nasty virus that had me down for 3 weeks. Johnny had to do the goat milking for much of that time. I am now functional again but not up to par. And the weather has been lousy.

So Easter passed with no giant eggs this year, the lawn llama was retired to the garden shed, and few photos were taken. Johnny, however, dyed eggs his traditional way and sent this email and photo to family:

"Made Easter eggs using MY Grandmother Fink's method.  Boiled them in pan with dry onion skins.  They get the prettiest brown color.  My grandpa would hide them outside around the yard just as we returned from the early morning church service.  Minutes after arriving Grandpa would rush into the room reporting he had just seen the Easter bunny outside.  We'd rush outside and find eggs hidden all over.  We believed him year after year about seeing the bunny because the eggs were still warm!   The fact that some were almost hot never fazed us.  True believers never question or doubt their Grandpa!"

...Grandpa Johnny

In good news on the farm, the first doe to kid had a lovely doeling. She also had a dead buckling. And so it has gone... But the doe kid is cute and healthy.

After several weeks of illness, I was able to drive the EZ Go down to the newly mowed (by Johnny) Qi Gong meadow, which I hope to turn into a wildflower meadow, and check on the trail camera I put up in the woods there a month earlier. I was hoping to see wild things since no domestics can get there (allegedly).

Well, there was one deer. The Black Angus calf had come through the fence from a neighbor, our dog and horse seem to be able to go anywhere, although we have tried and are trying to keep them contained.

A week or so later, the weather and my health were finally good enough for me to hike into the woods looking for birds and wildflowers... and finding both.

These Ruby-crowned Kinglets were feeding in the bushes across the creek (which is river-sized now from all the rain). I took photos as I could see them and then blew the photos way up to find the bird. Not the best photos, but I did get a little of the ruby crown on this first one!

That sunny afternoon was a gift. The next day we awoke to snow. Here is the view out the kitchen window.

And from the milkroom window in the barn...

But after snow flurries and light rain, the sky cleared and we had some sun again.

Here's to a sunnier, warmer, healthier spring from here on out.