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Wind and the robbins

As Kari was headed out Monday afternoon to pick up Rebecca from tennis camp she noticed something on the ground underneath the hackberry by the driveway and realized it must be a bird nest. It was a hot and windy day but she had no time to stop then. Later when she returned with Li’l r she remembered the nest and sent Rebecca to inspect it. Rebecca found it was sure enough a nest and there were two mostly naked chicks on the ground not far from it. They gathered the checks, put them back in the nest and showed Joyce who told Rebecca to find me, which she did.

My track record with baby birds is not good, especially for ones so young, but I had to do something. I felt their best chance was to return the nest to the tree and hope the parents would take it from there. So I got a step ladder and looked for a suitable place in the tree to put the nest. Did I mention it was a windy day? I found a spot where I could wedge the nest in among some small branches but I didn’t feel confident it would stay put in the wind. It was late in the day and darkness was approaching so we didn’t stay around to see what happened.

The next morning the nest was still in the tree and I saw an adult robin perched on a limb at the top of the smallish tree. That was encouraging but not definitive. Later Joyce and Kari were standing beneath the tree speculating whether the chicks survived their time on the ground. They didn’t think so in spite of the fact the adults seemed to have found the nest. As they were considering the odds of the chicks surviving, two little punkin heads popped up from the nest to confirm the chicks had survived their big adventure.

The pictures above were taken the following Sunday evening. I climbed a ladder to take the picture of the nest which was remarkably well made. When I tried to hold the camera above the nest to get a shot of the chicks they got shrieked and made a run for it. They had grown considerably in only a week. Joyce and I corralled the chicks and returned them to the nest while the adults scolded us. When Rebecca first brought me the nest with the chicks in it, I thought they were little mockingbirds or maybe bluejays because of their coloring. Now they look like little robins.

Green fields

by rakeeter

With the rain we had last weekend, SA has greened up nicely. I spent some time on the mower this past week and will again in the coming week. In fact, with the way the grass is growing it may be a matter of starting all over again as soon as I’ve finished going over the place. Or not. We’re going to have a stretch of hot and dry which, without any additional moisture, could make the grass go dormant. We shall see. Continue reading “Green fields” →

Memorial Day

by rakeeter

We are still bouncing back and forth between spring and summer. Thursday was hot with a strong west wind. Humidity was about 12%. We’ve dodged the hail, high winds and worse that have afflicted the Panhandle this month but we’ve also dodged the rain. I’ve recorded less than half an inch of moisture for May. While it was hot Thursday, there have been some chilly days this week as well. One day I might head off for work in shorts and a T-shirt and the next day in jeans and a couple of layers on the top end. We have some relatively cool weather in the forecast and ‘spec we better enjoy. It’s likely summer will set in any day now. Continue reading “Memorial Day” →

Blind snake

by rakeeter

While digging some soil out of the dirt mound to build Joyce some melon mounds on the caliche, I unearthed a blind snake. It could have been a New Mexico blind snake or a plains blind snake. If a NM blind snake, it was pretty far east of their normal range and if a plains, then it was north of its usual territory according to my Texas snakes field guide. I think it more closely resembled the picture of the NM blind snake in the guide, being rather pink. It was a feisty fellow and did its best to slither away but being only 5-8 inches long it just couldn’t cover ground all that fast. And then there was that whole white cane and dark glasses business to further impede.

Sometime in the last year or so, Rebecca found a carcass of what appeared to be a blind snake in their driveway. It had been thoroughly rendered two dimensional by vehicles but was still recognizable as a snake and not a worm, which the species closely resembles. Other than that I had never seen one before, which is not surprising sense they spend their lives underground. I guess the one mashed in the driveway tried to buck the system.

Egret in the pond

by rakeeter

egret — Great or Common Egret stock photo from Internet

Joyce hollered for me to come a running shortly after breakfast this morning. She was headed out the front door to plant some of the flowers she had yet to get into the various pots around the house and saw a big white bird in the pond. We didn’t get very close to it so we didn’t get a real good look, but I think it fit the Audubon bird guide description and picture of a great or common egret. It was considerably larger than a cattle egret so I think we can rule that out.

Later, or maybe earlier, Kari saw the egret strolling around the side of the house and Chris took this picture. I was concerned it might have been dining on the gold fish in the lily pool but Joyce and Rebecca confirmed the fish were still there after the bird was gone. It might have gobbled up a few frogs while wading in the pond but it was chilly this morning so maybe the frogs were sleeping in and escaped notice.