Baby Bluebird Rescue x 2

Saturday, July 5th

The previously mentioned babies saw their first snake! We suspect it's the previously photographed rat snake because we first saw it near the same location. Within the hour we were very excited to see it again, this time slithering along the backyard. Luckily, I am no longer using my Palm to shoot photos so as you'll see these are much better! Since I was mostly preoccupied with the twins, my son Simon had the presence of mind to shoot some fabulous snake shots.

We were a little slow to comprehend why we were so lucky to see this brazen fellow, but when he started heading toward the steadily chirping baby bluebirds we caught on! He was hungry.

We tried to stand in his path, hoping he would veer, but with no success. He made it to the tree and began climbing ! Knowing he wasn't poisonous, wasn't comfort enough to convince any of us to touch him at first. Using sticks we gently pushed him down and then tried moving him with the baby pool.

He escaped and headed back to the tree. My Dad got into the act and was brave enough to pick him up by the tail! He quickly doubled back on him though and was, ummm, quickly put back on the ground. I had put down my human baby and picked up the camera by this time, but the only shot I got of my Dad, the snake wrangler, was of his butt; I'll spare you that one. Finally, he was deposited in the woods and what we hoped was far enough away from the bluebird babies! They were safe!

Saturday, July 12th

I was enjoying my favorite view yesterday afternoon, looking down from my bedroom window, when I saw baby bluebirds diving out of their home like paratroopers from a plane. It was very exciting until I noticed that one of the birds had landed in the baby pool immediately below. Simon and I rushed outside to see if help was needed and found that a second baby bird had also landed in the pool. The parents were flying anxiously above, chirping furiously, but the babies were motionless,

one on the dry side,

the other on the wet.

The wet one was easy to scoop out using a frisbee. We deposited him on the grass

and the father found him quickly.

He hopped across the yard, finally taking flight.

He landed on the slide and slid right down to the bottom! I laughed out loud, but unfortunately didn't snap a picture. While all of this was going on the 2nd baby was still unmoving in the pool. Simon managed to get him out; I was too nervous to watch how he did it. neither mother nor father found this one right away. We didn't have to worry though, this little fellow was an expert in disguise.

Can you spot him in the grass?

Careful now, don't hurt his feelings, he's convinced he's invisible!

As we watched from afar he finally stuck his head up and his father found him! The family was reunited and hanging out in our woods!

Two final notes:

The offending pool is now empty and upside down so it can't catch anything else!

The snake appeared again today by the cutting garden. He seemed a little nervous around us this time and quickly headed back to the woods. Poor guy, I guess he doesn't know that with the bluebirds safe our interest in him is purely scientific!

A Week in Wildlife

Flower longhorn on the oregano which is always loaded with bumblebees. I counted 5 on a single flower this day.

Water striders devouring a beautiful, iridescent bee that had the misfortune to fall into our pond. The striders don't actually walk on water, but instead skate about on the water's film.


Dragonfly by the pond. There have been several around dipping their bums in the water which I assume means their laying eggs.

Millipede on the front step. Bedtime was delayed until I found my camera and took a couple of shots. I was never sure if they stung or not, but apparently they don't. Instead, they'll only curl up in a ball. Think of this though, according to the Virginia Cooporative Extension, "There were several locations in which the numbers of millipedes were so excessive that they swarmed over mulched flower beds and invaded basements and other ground level rooms in houses. At times there can be thousands of millipedes moving across lawn areas and into houses." Can you imagine? That's the stuff nightmares are made of.


The daddy (I think) bluebird peeking at the world.


I give up! I've been looking and looking for this one. I think it's some kind of skipper, but I'm just not sure. Any ideas out there?



A painted lady on lavender flowers.

This guy was floating in the lily pads. I love that you can see his webbed foot floating to the surface.

Another Batch of Bluebirds is on the way!

The bluebirds have just laid their 2nd clutch of eggs (the first was born in early May.) I think they still have a fledgling around helping them., but I'm not 100% sure.

Ironically, Kathy at Skippy's Vegetable Garden blogged about the bluebirds at her community garden today too. She has a link to a great Web site where I learned that if I had cleaned the first nest out of the house they may have rebuilt sooner.

This afternoon, I worked outside on the screened porch much to the dismay of the local birds. My worktable is right next to the mahonia with their fully ripened berries. A variety of birds would fly pell mell towards the shrubs, sense me and make sharper u-turns than I make with my Civic on my best day, heading in the opposite direction at an even faster speed than they arrived. Sometimes there were several of them flying in at a time as if they were playing tag. Occasionally, I stopped typing long enough that they felt comfortable eating a berry or two. but that never lasted long. One bird actually hit the screen in its excitement.

They all headed for the hills though when a group of crows arrived. They must have known what I only just learned a group of crows is called a murder. Ominous isn't it? They were huge so it's no wonder the smaller birds fled. Here's a picture I took of one of them in the bird tree. It's through the screen so it's not very good I'm afraid.

Early Morning Dance

Raucous chirping brought me to the window this morning, but I didn't expect to see anything. I figured there were babies somewhere and just wanted to get an idea of the nest's direction. Instead, in the kitchen garden, I saw a bizarre house finch mating ritual. The male was hopping around in the beds searching the ground and two females were bevvying for front position. When they got there they would fluff their feathers, jump up and down, and wriggle their bottoms on the ground. They pursued him through several beds before I returned to getting ready; when I looked again they were gone. I read on a Web site that "the female House Finch usually solicits food from the male," which explains the behavior, but the site doesn't say anything about two females vying for a males attention.

While I was trying to identify my birds I found a great site "WhatBird" which has a search feature that allows you to choose multiple characteristics and provides several possible results. You have to carefully read the three portions of the screen figure it out, but if you do that it works well.

If Rome had been built by finches...

it would have been built in a weekend!

My husband told me not to use that title, but I couldn't resist.

Last Thursday, I had a scare, our purple finch nest was gone! The only explanation I could think of was that one of our recent bad storms had blown it from its perch. My first thought was the babies. They had been getting so big they barely fit in the nest, but as far as I knew they had yet to fly. I searched, but found no sign of them. Research showed that they can leave the nest as early as 15 days; my blog showed that we saw the babies as early as 14 days before it was gone. We probably didn't see them the day they were born so I can only hope.

Saturday morning, my husband told me the parents were back and starting from scratch. We watched this weekend as the pair flew back and forth, the female's beak filled with Mike's freshly mown grass. The male empty-beaked. She would work head down, taking her time to construct carefully; he would sit on the rooftop and sing. Off they would fly again to repeat the process; her working, him singing. Occassionally, he would hop into the nest and wriggle his bottom around before flying off after her, but that seemed to be his biggest contribution to the project. That's okay though his song was beautiful and she obviously didn't need his help. The nest is beautiful without it!

Chicks and Seeds

We have babies! The bluebird babies in the bluebird house are very noisy and their parents are very busy flying back and forth to feed them. I don't begrudge a single worm they take from the garden for their hungry hatchlings. Next to the porch, on the gutter, we have four finch babies. These chicks are very quiet, and very cute! We have a great view of them; looking around inquistively as they wait for their parents, mouths wide open as they hope its their turn to eat. If you look to the left in the picture you can see a little head looking back at me through the screen. Their parents aren't as busy as the bluebird ones and that's partly our fault. If we're on the porch and move when they're on their way in they do a quick about face and head to the safety of a tree.

This was a big planting weekend in the kitchen garden. I put in the tomatoes and lots of seeds. Lettuce, carrots, spinach, corn, pole beans, borage, basil and dill. Some I'm afraid I've put in too late for the hot weather we've been experiencing (lettuce, spinach); some too early if we experience one more frost (corn, tomatoes.)

The asparagus is doing great! Some of it is almost as tall as the fence already (4 ft tall!) Pretty impressive for a 3 week old! I planted them in a trench as I was told, but was confused about when to backfill. Most of what I read said you do it over the developing fern, but I didn't exactly have ferns at first, I had asparagus spears that were shooting straight up and then developing thin little leaves. Was that what I should be backfilling? Finally, I confirmed that yes, that was it. Hopefully, that's right.

Friday night, Simon and I spent some time watching the snake; seeing him swim is really cool! As you can see, I got a new picture. He was very entertaining, much more so than the fish. They were friendly at first, but then our part Labrador dog who thinks the pond is his playground, scared them into a seemingly permanant hiding. If they don't start coming out soon, we may decide to keep the snake no matter how big he gets!

Saturday, we woke up to find frog eggs in the pond! Thank God! While I've been very supportive of their efforts to find love, they're so noisy about it. We tried to have the patio door open the night they finally found it, but we couldn't hear the TV over their song.

Mike and I finally moved that boxwood! He dug out the yucca that was on the corner of our front bed and just didn't fit with the plantings of boxwood and holly shrubs. Digging out the boxwood wasn't too bad. I think Paul James' trick worked for getting the roots adjusted to rootball size, but getting under the shrub was still hard. Lifting it was the worst though; it took both of us to lift it into the wheelbarrow. Hopefully, it will be happy in its new home. It sure looks great there! No picture I'm afraid...the camera died.

Yack

Unfortunately, I don't mean chatting. The day after I posted my last entry, showing off my newly improved waterfall, I returned home to see something on the top. Going closer I found that a bird had expressed it's opinion of our renovations complete with partially digested beetle shells, sunflower seeds and insect wings. Now some may take this as criticism, but I think it goes to show that the creature was literally moved by the renewed beauty it beheld and the invigorating gurgling beneath its feet.

Dinner Outside on the Porch

It was such a lovely, warm evening that we ate outside on the porch for the first time! Two mourning doves were battling over territory while we ate and occassionally we saw what we suspect and hope is a mama bluebird peeking her head out of the bluebird box. Even though dinner was only cleaning out the frig, everything tasted especially delicious listening to the birds and smelling fresh air.