Spring...or not.

An ugly day outside. Cold. Rain. Storm warnings out.  This morning when I left work there was frozen precipitation covering my car windows.  This is so not like Spring.  Or is it?  I suppose it is typical for early Spring.

those of us with Spring (planting) fever don't want to admit it.

A few pics from the past couple days. 

I thought this female was so pretty with her striped brow, despite it being a house sparrow. 

 Is it just me, or are mourning doves a bit comical?

 I believe this is Little Dude! Can't remember if I reported that the space under the shed has been opened up for awhile now, though I hadn't been seeing him. I think he's using that as an extra escape path, rather then full time residence.  I saw him, noticeably smaller then the one the other day, across the stream.  He was having problems figuring out how to get across the stream.  The swiftness of the water made him hesitant to cross, plus it's a bit wider, so it's almost impossible for him to jump over like he had last summer.

So he backs out of there and makes his way over to a tree that hangs over the stream. Part way up he realizes it's going UP. So he turns around and goes back down the trunk.

Finally he decides on a branch that lays across the stream and makes it safely over.

 The attraction?  Cracked corn.

 Gets comfy, laying down to eat! 

 He knows I'm watching from the window.  He did run off, and headed for the burrow under the shed.

 This little muskrat has been busy. It seems to be making use of the whole stream. Very ambitious.  Makes me wonder if he's got a mate and needs to do a lot of work building a burrow.

 Though the above pics show him looking a bit like a drowned rat, here you can see that very little of his fur is actually wet.

 While I was following him along the stream I noticed a lot of splashing in some areas he passed.  I suspected what it was, though I thought it was a little early. But the creek chub are making that difficult trip up the stream. It's cool to watch them. They have to flick their fin a lot to make it over ridges of rocks and through the small rapids. They always to go the spot in the stream where it bends around the corner. Creek chub are known for the stone piles they build in streams, into which eggs are deposited. There's plenty of stone here for them!  The one in the photo, also had 2 others right along side him, looking almost like they were riding partly on him.  I'm wondering if they travel like that, using the power of several swishing fins to launch them over the rocks.

One of them startled me, as I must have startled him when I put a bucket in the stream to get some water for the butterfly bush I'd just transplanted yesterday.

What a mess I made of that. I know little of these things, truth be told. I have to look up everything, or ask Sister. I didn't  realize how shallow rooted these plants are, and thus how far out their roots can travel.  It looks like one of them made its way under the patio. I'm hoping I didn't disturb Bobs burrow tooooo much. Let's just say I disturbed a lot of yard yesterday! 

Sister told me I could cut off some of the root.  I had researched about transplanting this, but didn't see anything about the roots until after getting Sisters advice. Then I found more info! Isn't that usually the way?  But actually by talking to her I was able to better define my Google search.

So we'll see if this works or not.

This robin was chirping away. I took some video but seems the sounds didn't pick up nearly as well as I was hearing it.  But you can see it's beak is open. It was a very short chirping. At first I didn't think it was coming from the robin.

It is the high-pitched "Seeeee" call,  given in response to the presence of an aerial predator, like a hawk. Hmmm it mistook me for a hawk?

We're getting some thunder now. That's Spring like isn't it!

new growth

Before I share my stuff I wanted to encourage you to visit this blog:
http://midmarsh.blogspot.com/
Located in Lincolnshire in the UK.  I love seeing the different birds they have in the UK, or the same bird species, but with different colors that he posts.  But the best lately has been the remote video of the visiting hedgehogs!

Now for today, there will not be any duck photos, or duck stories.  I promise.
With Spring there is finally more going on in the yard! woohoo!

Let me start by saying, Sister was right.
Last year I was always worrying about whether something would grow, come back, etc.  Not just worrying, but doubts. A lot of doubts. The ground is crappy here to begin with, and I always compare to her yard which always looks so great in the summer.  And she works hard at it.  I can't say I do the same. 

One plant in particular I had doubts about was the speedwell. It grew, but slowly and it never turned into anything close to what she had.  She told me more then once not to worry, that I just needed to wait till next year, it will be fine.  Some times I thought she was just being the nice.

But here it is, in all three spots I planted it, coming right back up.  I'm very excited by this!

These iris are a welcome sight. They survived last years flash flood.

It looks like the pawpaw trees are ok too.  I wasn't sure about the one I'd just planted before the flash flood, since it dropped about 2 feet of silt and rock on that part of the yard.

Cranberry Ice Dianthus.  One plant that really seems to grow well here is dianthus. Any kind of dianthus.  So I embrace dianthus!

I knew what this was when I took the picture, now I can't remember what it is. I know I saw the foxglove coming back, and the burning bush starting to leaf at the bottom of the plant.

  Daffodils are slowly growing.  Bulbs don't seem vigorous planted here.  Maybe I'll get around to enhancing this little area this year.

 Day lilies.  I'm not a fan but my neighbor had planted these a couple years ago. And they have survived so much, it's best to just let them there!

I knew what this was when I took the picture, now I can't remember what it is.

  
 P. x mexicali (penstemon red rocks)

 Rue!  Good to see this coming up so soon. Sister tells me that the black swallowtail is the first butterfly to come back and this was very popular with them last year for laying eggs.

 ahhh more speedwell!!

 Creeping jenny waking up.

 This also excites me. This is my boomerang lilac I planted last season.  Boomerang means it's supposed to bloom twice in a season.

Cat mint!

bath time!

 Singing his little heart out.  The song sparrows have been spending hours singing.  Nice to hear after the quiet time of winter.

 One of the larger groundhogs getting a drink...

 until he realizes he's being watched. Amzing that he notices, from across the stream and yard AND I was in the house, taking the photo through the window.

 A grackle in the tree. I took it through both screen and dirty window LOL But the sun was shining on him bringing out all those colors.

 The birds have a lot of safe places to hang out. Good thing since the hawk has been very actively chasing the birds and he's quite adept at winging his way through all the trees and brush.

 Not sure what was up with the squirrel. I was watching out the window, it saw me and lay down where he was.

 Then went to the other side of the stream and again lay against a tree trunk.

 This tufted titmouse kept flitting around and landing over my head.  May be checking out my hair for nesting. One did that one summer while Sister was visiting, landing on each of us, in turn giving us the once over, looking up at our hair. Then it flew under the porch and came out with some nesting material.  Guess we didn't have anything worthy!

dark eyed junco

 a molting goldfinch

a little duck tail

Walking back from getting a free Italian ice at Rita's (they give it away free on the first day of Spring) I noticed this duck, walking fast across their path.

I suspected something was about to happen.

 He stopped for a moment when he noticed me.

You can tell by the waters disturbance he is swimming quickly. Notice the pair of ducks ahead. He heads right for them.

I was momentarily distracted, but when I looked back the duck had chased his prey, a pretty little female mallard back near the path. As she got to land, he grabbed her by the feathers on the back of her neck and dragged her into the water.

He repositioned his bill to the back of her head as he mounted her.

 She struggled.

 So he forces her head below the waters surface to make her compliant to his desire.

 Her head breaks the surface as he rolls off her back.

 She tries to shake it off like a bad dream.

 oh the shame of it all

 Here he comes again, as if to say, "Look! I put my head under the water and it doesn't bother me!"

 "Gonna wash that mallard right out of my hair, errr, feathers!"

 Giving one last good shake all the way back to her tail.

The End