Spin Cycle

In the background is a peppy little voice cheerfully chattering  about the nautical look, and how we can now take it the office. As she burbles away, I stare at this nautical look, and I wish I could. But I don't think that's what the etalk hostess means. This spring has been so long coming, that now that it's here, I find myself slightly off kilter. Not quite in focus and a bit soft.

Like dawn on the river. It holds me spellbound as I count hundreds, no thousands of ducks and geese, gathering, gabbing, gobbling, and going on their way. I sit and wonder where they have been. Where they will be tomorrow. I want to know their unknowable journeys. I want their promises to return. Again and again.

Like violets, and daffodils.

The cheery greeting I am given upon arrival is worth the long winter's wait.

And I smile, happy that they're so...so relentlessly yellow! 

They wink and nod with the spirit of spring.

Like little red squirrels who have waited for months to scold someone.

Anyone. Me.

Like a tightly coiled furry little spring, he can't stop moving. Or chirping.

"I'm alive! I'm alive! You are too! What are you doing? Where are the peanuts?

Get the nuts! I'm alive! I'm starving here! Hurray! Hurry.

No, don't stop. Don't look at the birds. I know they're cute. So am I!

Okay, one little look... Hurry!" 

How can one look just once?

This place has me on spin cycle.

I love Spring.

I'm alive.

Little Goosey Gander

Little Goosey Gander

Wither do you wander?

Upstairs

Downstairs

In the master's chamber.

(Who dreamt up that little ditty? What could it possibly mean?)

I have no idea what it means! But I do know that over the years, given all the crap and oil and crap and oil that has been placed in the way of all creatures great and small, I have developed a profound respect for any thing with wings who manages to fly by me!

Welcome back  Canada Goose, my  personal harbinger of Spring.

Honkkkk...honkk...hey You! Featherbrain? You listenin' to me?

yes'm.

for more views of the skies around this world, check out
http:www.skyley.blogspot.com

Good Morning

It is a good morning. Southern breeze, northern geese. I wake up and sigh.

They write words on the water while I listen to their clatter chat.

A lone Scoter is as rare as this morning in November. I linger.

View more at http://www.skyley.blogspot.com

It's Just Another Day

24 hours. Nothing special planned. No where to go, no one to see, nothing that has to get done. A take it as it comes kind of day. And so I did.
Busloads of tourists come to our area every year to see the fall colours. The tour operators tag the tours with catchy names like "The Flaming Leaf" or "Autumn Rhapsody". We call them a sure sign that winter's on its way.



















As I was taking the shot of the leaves, I could hear a little chirping. Saw a quick flit out of the corner of my eye and swung the camera in that direction, hoping to capture the source of the commotion. Ah Ha! A little Yellow Rumped Warbler...so cute. Often called "Butter Bum" and you can see why.

















This is a shot of the Ottawa River from the bridge that links Ontario and Quebec. These rapids were used as a "Toll Gate" by the Algonquin back in the days when the fur trade and les voyageurs were combing this area, seeking pelts and prospecting for tall pines for masts for her majesty's ships back in England. The Algonquin wouldn't let them use the portages on either side of the rapids until they paid with tools, utensils, beads, or whatever the hot commodity was in favour that season.





















The sky on Tuesday evening, through the living room window. Raining in Greenwood. Funny thing about living on the river, in the Ottawa Valley. There are hills to the north and south of us (hence, valley) and the weather will often circle around us. It was the other side's turn to get wet.














This morning, the view from the window is completely different. Large flocks of Canada Geese rest in our bay overnight, lulling us to sleep with their chatter, and waking us up with the same...only more insistent and considerably louder.



















Just after I took the shot the geese from the window, the sun burst through the clouds...day break. And that's the past 24 hours at home in the Valley. Now on to the next.

Kodak Moments

A new camera is pretty much an open invitation to take pictures of any and everything in sight, play with all of the crazy settings and generally, lose your focus! This is, after all, a blog that is supposed to mention birds from time to time. But, peaches , log homes, sunflowers, Lola and Vera, and eggplants have pretty much taken over of late!

Time to remedy that!

I am so lucky to live in an amazing place, on the water, and with a back yard filled with mixed hard and soft woods. So on any given day, there's lots to divert my attention span, and render it to a series of Kodak moments.

Kodak One -

Black-capped Chickadee dee dee dee. I think these are the cutest little creatures in the world, and love it when they land on my hand to take the proffered sunflower seed. Like being touched by a fairy!

Kodak Two - Goose bums. I would love to get a picture of these guys under water. Are they standing on their bills?Are they tilted totally forward on their little webbed feet?

Is it a contest?

Kodak Three -Knock knock !

Who's there?

Gonna.

Gonna who?

Gonna Getcha!

What, you expected better from a bird brain?

Kodak Four - Private Screening. The awesome thing about this not so awesome photo is that I'm actually standing inside the screened in porch, and the tiny RTHB is sitting outside.

And the amazing camera has shot right

through the screen mesh!

Wow.

Kodak Five - Milkweed Seed Pod...no birds yet,

but once it opens, the American goldfinches love to use the fluff to feather their nests.

And all's right with the world.

Fowl Morning

I usually stumble out of bed every morning around 6:30 am, and head to the kitchen to put the coffee on (organic, fair trade of course). This is the view that greeted me on Tuesday.

The feathered flotilla had arrived! Where we live on the Ottawa River, there’s a fairly shallow bay, Bellows Bay -and it’s a local birding hotspot for waterfowl. Not sure why it’s called Bellows Bay though – perhaps after the cows that pasture beside it?
But I digress. It was a spectacular sight…all these geese swimming on water so calm they were making little goose wakes.

There’s a reason I’m often a few minutes late for work! I’d much rather sit and sip my coffee and just take it all in.! And you never know what else will show up…like this pair of Wood Ducks. In my mind, the most beautiful ducks in the world! Right in front of me, no less! Look! Duck Duck Goose for real!

There’s really no appropriate place for them to nest on our beach – some big old trees yes, but some big old dogs and some big old boats …and if they choose the tree they’re scoping out this morning, by the end of the month they’ll be fifty feet from water, not 10 as it is right now with spring run-off.
The intrepid little pair of fancy ducks just marched right out of the water, and up the slope to check out the pine tree. Man! I need a better camera!

Don’t think they like the neighbourhood, sadly. Not sure that the phoebe likes the purple martin house either. I know! It needs a lick of paint – it’s on John’s honey-do list….right after plant the garden, fix the porch ceiling and screens, build new deck, lay flooring in the basement, new ceiling there too, and paint the family room area. So, uhm, might get done soon… or it might not.

Oh oh, look at the time! I’m going to be late again.
Dang! Memo to self. Find a clone.

Lunching with the Birds

The Waterfront ( at left, bird’s eye view in summer) is a beautiful park just minutes from my office, and today, as temperatures climbed up into the double digits for the first time since last fall, it beckoned.
The 2009 Spring List begins in earnest!
Song Sparrow - perched on top of a willow and singing his little heart out. He was being answered too, but I never saw that coy little one.
Canada Geese - preening on the ice flows where the Ottawa and Muskrat Rivers meet.
Common golden-eye, dippin’ and divin’ and generally showing off in front of the geese.
American Black Ducks – a small, noisy flock on the water, bathing and being rather quarrelsome with each other.
And the other usual suspects –ring billed gulls, crows, ravens and starlings –circling the lunch timers out for a stroll, hoping to pick up a cast off French fry or two.
Not a long list, but a beginning…and after this past winter, which was as long and cold and snowy as any I can remember, it’s a good beginning. “Cheer-up!”