Mar 22, 2012 | Wildlife |
Yes we have eggs! Chickadee eggs that is. 4 of them as of Wednesday afternoon.
4 chickadee eggs on 3/21
They normally lay one a day until they are done at around 6. So today would have been 5 and tomorrow would be 6. These are the chickadees who won the war over the house.
The bluebirds seem to still be interested in house#3 – there is a starter nest in there. And I have seen a little activity today so maybe they finally decided and will get busy.
I have lots of other birds in the yard just no other nests that I have found. The robins were busy building because they keep coming to my yard for materials but then they fly over by the neighbors yard toward Danette’s house so they must be building over there some where. I didn’t get a picture but I did have to laugh at the robin the other day she was trying to get a string of plastic that was peeking out from underneath the siding on the back of our house (they put a plastic sheet up before the siding goes up) and she pulled and pulled trying to get it loose. I was too slow with the camera though.
I have lots of cardinals, brown thrashers, mocking birds, mourning doves, finches, blue jays, woodpeckers and more. Spring is definitely in full swing here.
Mar 18, 2012 | Wildlife |
Spring is here – we have lots of things starting to bloom at my house. The Daffodils have come and gone already, the azaleas are blooming now, the cherry trees are blooming and the hostas are popping quickly out of the ground. And the birds are here and busy finding homes to build their nests and lay eggs. So it’s time to start posting about the birds in my yard. This year I have 5 birdhouses – 3 I have had for a long time, one is the woodpecker house which was up last year but no nesters, and the last one is a window house – it is attached to one of our windows so you can see from the inside – I got it late in the season last year – we’ll see if anyone is interested in it – I’m not sure it is in a very good spot so I may need to move it.
Chickadee 3-7
So you may be wondering about my post title – or maybe not – Bird House Wars – it seems every year the chickadees and the bluebirds want to use the same bird house. And this year is no different. The chickadees started early in March and worked on a nest in House #2. It seems that once they build a nest they go on vacation and leave it alone for about a week. The bluebirds seem to do the same thing – I’m not sure if it is really true or just that I don’t see the activity because it slowed down once the nest was built.
chickadee nest 3-11
Anyway the chickadees built themselves a nest. They use moss, a little bit of straw and then they line it with fur. I’m not sure whose dog is missing some fur but there are a lot around and they have grabbed white and brown fur this year.
But then I noticed the bluebirds checking out House #2. This is common – I’m not sure why they like this house so much better – it’s right by the driveway so you would think that it would be less desirable because the cars and activity on the driveway.
The bluebirds decide to unbuild the chickadee nest – they want to take out all the fur. They spent a couple of days trying to do this and the chickadees would bring it back in. You can see in the pictures the bluebirds are pulling stuff out of the house. If you look in the hole to the house you can see all the nesting material pulled up.
bluebirds on 3-14 taking stuff out of the house
bluebird 3-14
The chickadees did not give up though – they would put everything back in after the bluebirds took it out.
chickadee 3-14
And in the end it seems the chickadee won this year and is staying in house #2. The bluebirds have now started looking at house #3 – I’m not sure they are convinced that is where they want to be though. They took a peek in house #1 also. I’ll keep you posted if I see any more nest building going on and I’ll keep tabs on the chickadees to see when they start laying eggs.
We also had a visitor to the yard on Friday night. I let the dogs out around 11 and they took off toward the fence and started barking – oh no what is out there I wonder. I go running out to see and it is a opossum up on the rail. He starts waddling (they don’t run and they aren’t fast) along the fence and the dogs are barking and jumping and I’m trying to grab them. The opossum stops to lean over and I think he is going to bite them or me or fall – none of which seem like good things. I’m still trying to catch the dogs and he continues to waddle – it the timing of the jumps and the opossom leaning over had been just right we would have had trouble. Finally he made it all the way to the back corner of the yard and moved on to the neighbors fence. The dogs continued to bark and I continued to try to grab them – not an easy task when they don’t want to be grabbed. In all that time I thought why isn’t someone coming out here to help me – finally Ryan came and rounded up Magnolia, while I finally got Aspen. And Greg was inside – he had no clue there was anything going on. That was our Friday night adventure.
Mar 8, 2012 | family, My Digital Studio, Scrapbook Pages, Wildlife |
This is another layout from Heather’s MDS class. This is “The many faces of Tyler” – my boys don’t want me to take their picture. I tend to get turned heads, something in front of the face, eyes closed, goofy looks and everything in between. Tyler is the worst of the three and I always tell him one day I’m going to create a scrapbook page with those crazy pictures.
Well that day has come and I added some of those silly pictures of Tyler – this was Easter last year and I wanted some pictures of the boys. Putting something in front of his face, puffy chest with a funky face, wide open mouth!
I thought the silly frogs suited the layout and all the bright papers. The little pennant punch is lots of fun to use to make banners!
On another subject – I thought I’d give you a quick update on my birds – for those that enjoy the bird posts during the spring time. I am starting to see activity in the yard. Today I noticed the chick-a-dees active around one of the houses and when I peeked in – they are starting to build a nest. When I find my camera I’ll get a picture. And exciting news – the red-bellied woodpecker was inside the woodpecker house today! The other times I’ve seen him (I think it is the male) was just looking in but today he was inside – I think that’s a good sign – now to keep an eye out for his mate and hope that she lays some eggs inside. I also saw a Tufted Titmouse looking in one of the houses yesterday (the same one they used last year) – so hopefully they will be back. And I think the bluebirds came by the feeders not sure if they checked out any of the houses this time though. I’m excited for the birds to begin nesting again – we’ll see how many babies we have this year!
Feb 28, 2012 | My Digital Studio, Sale-A-Bration 2012, Scrapbook Pages, Stampin' Up! Events, Wildlife |
Hey! I have been busy playing with My Digital Studio. Cindy and I held our first My Digital Studio Club meeting this month and it was so much fun. We are planning a demo retreat for my next downline meeting in March – we have some fun new projects planned for that. And then I decided to take Heather Summer’s Online class to try to learn some of the tips and tricks she uses to create her awesome projects. I also thought I would challenge myself to create each day using the project that was shared in the class. So far so good – it’s been 8 days now and I have 8 layouts done and I’m happy with each and every one. I have a link to Heather’s blog on the right side bar of my blog.
So far I’m pretty much using the layouts as they were designed for the class but usually changing up the colors, designer papers, stamp sets because I don’t always have the same downloads that she uses.
Day 1 – this is the Leadership March this year at the Stampin’ Up! Leadership conference. That’s me on stage – I’m not sue what I was doing with my arms out like that but one of my friends got a picture. I guess it was a “hey look at me I’m on stage”. Its always exciting to get to be on my stage for something and since I haven’t done it very often I don’t quite know what to do. My first walk across stage was at convention last summer.
The designer paper I used here comes from the Sale-A-Bration My Digital Studio CD. I stuck with the Pool Party, Poppy Parade and Soft Suede colors because the pictures showed the blue and red of the stage decorations. I also added brads from the same CD – I love that little butterfly brad.
Soon it will be time for the bird to build nests in the yard. The last two days I’ve seen bluebirds checking out the houses – we’ll see which house they pick this year – they seem two go back and forth between two and the chick-a-dees usually take the one they don’t. I’ve also had a red-bellied woodpecker spending a lot of time looking in the woodpecker house we mounted more than a year ago. Oh and the Cedar Waxwings came through this weekend – they always come in a big flock and pass through – I happened to see them as they made a brief stop in the yard (seemed like most just stopped to rest and “relieve themselves” – big mess). I tried to take some pictures but they were way up in the tops of the trees – I’ll download them soon they are on my big camera. So I’ve rambled enough – time to move on. Have a great day!
May 5, 2011 | Wildlife |
Yep all the baby birds have now fledged. The Chickadees left over the weekend sometime and the Tufted Titmice left either late Tuesday or early Wednesday morning. I knew when I let the dogs out Wednesday morning and it was quiet outside that they must be gone. They were very noisy these past few days – practicing inside that little house using their wings – its hard to believe they all fit in there. Every once in a while I’d see a little head poke out and then a few minutes later mom or dad would fly up and push him back in – “you are not ready yet, dear” – “but mom, I am, I’m ready to fly, let me pleeeeese”. But the day came and this afternoon they seemed to be up in the trees by my drive way. Mom and dad are still feeding the babies – I think for 2 or 3 more weeks they bring them food and then teach them where to find the food. Here are some pictures for you –
Tufted Titmouse babies on 4-29
Tufted Titmouse - 5-2
- Tufted Titmouse – mom on the roof with food
Tufted Titmouse baby peeking out of the house
Tufted Titmouse baby yelling
This last picture is my favorite. I didn’t even realize I had gotten a picture with his mouth wide open. He is probably yelling “mooooooooom!” I set my camera to sports mode so that it would take multiple shots at one time so this was one of the ones in the series that came out while I was watching the house. Mom (or dad) came shortly after and pushed the baby back in. These were taken on May 2nd (Monday) and they left the house not to long after that – you can see how ready this little guy was. Perhaps he was standing on his brother or sisters head, or inside flapping his wings (I just can’t imagine all 6 of them in there flapping their wings), but more than likely he was hanging on to the little screen that is attached to the side right under the hole.
And here is one more new visitor to my yard –
hummingbird
I have been seeing the hummingbird every day for a while now. I got this quick picture on Sunday. I’ll try to get some better ones from a different angle. And yesterday I decided to look in my big holly bush by the front door to see if there might be a nest in there. The bush is on the side of a steep hill so I have to look from underneath the bush at the top side of the hill. At first I didn’t see anything but then on the far side – where the hill is the steepest – I can see two nests – I just can’t see in them because they are facing the other way. Since I’ve never looked in there before they may be very old. In fact they are so close together I would bet at least one of them is an old nest. Maybe the weekend I can try to figure out how to get a look inside them.
i hope you enjoy the pictures of my little birdies!
May 4, 2011 | Wildlife |
I thought I had posted this on Sunday – but guess what it was still in my drafts folder – I must not have finished it! Sorry about that. I have more to share with what has been going on since Sunday but I’ll go ahead and post this for now and do another update tomorrow.
I posted an update on the Chickadee babies a couple of days ago. I need to go check the house today because they may have fledged now. The Tufted Titmouse babies are still in the house – and boy are they loud! Every time mom or dad fly in you can hear them – “feed me, feed me, it’s my turn, let me have it”. I need to go back and count the days for them to see how close we are to their date. Here are some of the pictures I’ve taken over the last week or so.
bringing food on 4-14
Tufted Titmouse babies 4-21
Tufted Titmouse babies on 4-21
They figured out that I didn’t have any food to feed them.
Tufted Titmouse babies 4-23
Tufted Titmouse babies 4-27
look at how cute and fuzzy we are now!
I have lots of other birds in the yard just no other nests that I have found. The robins were busy building because they keep coming to my yard for materials but then they fly over by the neighbors yard toward Danette’s house so they must be building over there some where. I didn’t get a picture but I did have to laugh at the robin the other day she was trying to get a string of plastic that was peeking out from underneath the siding on the back of our house (they put a plastic sheet up before the siding goes up) and she pulled and pulled trying to get it loose. I was too slow with the camera though.
