2023

Well, this one is scary! But look at the adorable dragon gargoyle!

Okay! Up the hill!

I saw the deers first, but the camera was not being agreeable...

And then the deers were being skittish. I assumed someone was walking a dog, around the corner. But actually it was these guys! haha!

Mourning Doves! So nice to see our native doves for once!

But I'm actually up here to visit the Acorn Woodpeckers.

They are too far away again. SIGHS!

SIGHS!

Well. That's not a woodpecker! haha.

Varied Thrush. There is such a great diversity of native birds up here. They are doing construction, further up the hill and dang, I hope they don't cut these trees down.

That's all I get today. That's okay, I'll keep coming up here and they'll come closer eventually!

Back down the hill, and there's a whole flock of female Turkeys... Over a dozen! And they were just walking on past me!

And checking out the patios!

So Cool!

oh, poor mangy dearheart... barely has any fur.

I don't know. Do squirrels get the mange? I bet she's terribly cold. And just another continuation of The Year of Sick and Injured Wildlife. Sighs.

I wish I could magically throw some medicine at her and make her better!

Okay. Here I am at the Community Garden, with another, healthier squirrel. She's got a small sunflower head... They like to cut the heads off and just take them with them, to munch on at their leisure!

Here's a sunflower head in my plot that the squirrels didn't take! It's empty of seeds... it provided food to many birds!

This is the section I'm going to work on today.

You can see all the Early Girl tomatoes, from where I pulled up that plant the other day. Today I'm going to untangle the two SunGolds from their tomato cages, and the Striped German.

And wow, those SunGolds had some roots! It was really hard to pull them out of the ground! And, of course, they were sprawling all over the place, so getting them out of the tomato cages wasn't easy either!

I really need to think about doing something with the soybeans!

Someone else's kale.

Hello Young Fellow!

There was some excitement on the way to the Community Garden.

On the bike path, barely a block away from the Garden, it's probably 9:40ish am. There are two cops, woman and man, on the path talking to a homeless guy on the other side of the creek. I couldn't see him at all, thru the trees.

Woman Cop: okay. Thank you.
Man Cop: (Indistinct but asking a question)
Homeless guy: ahhhh. (Long pause) No.

(I don't even know what's going on... but that very long pause jumped out at me. That guy is SO guilty!) I'm within hearing disance now, walking on by.

Cop: So you didn’t shoot a pistol or something like that?
Homeless guy: I was just listening to my music. (Indistinct)
Cop: Because it was reported in this area. (Pause) Exactly where you are.

So that's just great. Shots fired at the bike path.

And now I’m kinda freaked because somebody's shooting their stupid gun... and are they even paying attention to where they are pointing that thing?!

Sighs.

And then I get to the garden and I'm starting to futz around in my plot when I notice there's a woman, on the inside of the Garden fence walking past all the gates. She stops at the gate I had just come in and rattles the chain. I always spin the lock well.

She walks back the way she came... and climbs up on a chair...

I have so many questions. Like how the heck did she get in? And what did she do, while she was in here? She obviously didn't take anything.

Well. Some things you just have to let go. I keep an eye on her, but I've got stuff to do today!

I started out the season with about 30 soybean plants. Not all of them grew up to normal size, but most of them did.

As I pulled pods off the stalks, I counted what I was getting from each plant... there were 60 to 70 pods on an average plant. They were in clusters of 1 to 5 pods every 6 or 8 inches going up each stalk, and a plant had at least a couple branches of stalks.

I had brought three small ziplocks with me... but those filled up quickly! ha! I pulled out one of the gallon ziplocks that I always carry with me, and got it mostly filled as well!

Awesome!

On the way home... there were different cops, and a couple of Parks employees poking around the bike path, their trucks parked on the grass nearby.

I checked the police dispatch log when I got home. And sure enough...

Call time: 09:09:33 AM
Dispatch time: 09:29:30 AM
Incident Desc: Shot(s) Fired
Disposition: PATROL CHECK

Sighs.

Back at home, I spread out the soybean pods and put a fan on them. Most of the soybeans were on stalks that were standing up and those were ovbiously good and dry, they rattled in their pod. But some stalks had fallen over and were on the ground and wet. This should help!

And, wow, that's a lot of pods I'm gonna need to shell out!

It's been mid-60s (18°C), and even the nights have been warmer, in the mid-50s (13°C). And yesterday afternoon, it got so warm I was able to open up my bedroom window again.

I got to listen to the rain all night, and that's the best thing ever!

Today, still it rains!

So I'm just walking in the neighborhood today. The rain means I probably won't see much wildlife, and the camera will remain tucked under the rain jacket.

But the trees are so lovely, I just can't resist a little bit of photography!

Good Morning, Friend!

Henrietta is busy hunting. (Nov9... Yep, this is Henrietta!)

Last night got too chilly and I had to close my bedroom window again. I guess I need to get used to the fact that winter is coming!

Blazey's Guy, running errands on his bike, passes me twice! When he goes by the second time, he tells me there are geese, way out at the school. I wasn't going to walk that far today... but I can't turn down the first flock of Cackling Geese of the season!

Cackling Geese are the smallest cousins of Canada Geese. We have both species this time of year, but the Cacklings... uh, Cacklers? heh. Tend to gather together in huge flocks.

The clouds are starting to break up.

On my way back, I noticed a spider web, glistening in the sunlight...

Wow, her anchor lines are at least 12feet long! And she's caught lots of food.

Oh, hey! It's that youngster I saw in the park the other day with the shortened tail!

I've seen him three times now - I also saw him out my bedroom window a couple days ago. And that's the point where I usually give someone a name. But... I don't know. I get the feeling that he's still wandering and doesn't have an actual territory yet.

I'll hold off on the name until I see him again.

I get to the top of the trail and walk up to the Acorn Woodpeckers home. The sun is coming out... and can you see? There's the faintest of rainbows leading right to my woodpecker friend!

They are just SO interesting!

They've managed to jam two acorns into some of the holes!

I thought I was going to work at the garden today. But it started sprinkling before I got there... and I walked right on past!

I do regret the backpack, tho. It's got the hand tools in it: spade, shears and dandelion tool, along with other odds and ends like garden gloves and such. It's not terribly heavy, but my back was hurting a lot by the time I got home, having walked around 5 miles with it!

Ha! We are almost the same colour as the leaves and branches!

Oh! Pigeons!

They are cool, but weren't very interested in getting their portrait taken.

Back at home, I decide to do some shelling!

Well. This is not going very quickly. I glanced at the time while I shelled 100 Soybeans, and it took me over 15minutes. Dang. How long to do all of these??!

Hopefully I will get faster!

There's more rain in the forecast, so today I'm digging up the sweet potatoes. The vines had died with the below freezing temperatures at the end of October and it's time to see what we've got!

At the garden, I dig!

I am pleased with all the Sweet Potatoes I dig up under the first plant! There are some good sized tubers, tho they all have cracks in them. That's a bummer, I don't know why that happens.

Under the second plant... there's hardly anything! I dig more and find a couple of potatoes that may have belonged to the first plant. ha. oh well!

The water is still on, which makes this a lot easier! The dirt is mud and I'm glad I get to wash off the sweet potatoes before I haul them home.

Once home, I set a fan on them to get them as dry as possible. I always lose a couple anyway because mold starts growing on some of them right away. And they don't keep, I'll have to eat them quickly!

While in the porch room, I notice the Peace Lily is blooming!

In the evening, I get back to the soybeans.

I've now shelled 500 soybeans. And my shelling technique is def getting more efficient.

When I started, it took over 15min to shell 100 soybeans. Now it's taking closer to 10mins.

So that's good. And I've made a pretty good dent in the pile.

It's a little chilly this morning, 39° tho the wind chill makes it 33°, brr. But the forecast says the rain will hold off until this evening, so I decide to walk west on the bike path today.

I thought this was Henrietta...

But the more I look at all the pics from today, that's def not the same heron I have been seeing! That dark blue patch at her shoulder is quite a bit bigger. huh.

And now I'm looking at previous photos. oh my gosh! There are def two Great Blue Herons at the creek! This one, with the big blue shoulder patch and another one with a very small patch. And I've been calling them both Henrietta! haha!

I need to look into this! *** But first...

I'm going out to the unnamed wetlands again.

There's nothing special here.

Or, I should say... I haven't yet discovered what's special here!

But I always seem to find some birds on the walk back!

There's a little flock of Bushtits.

As usual, they bounce around too quickly for me and the camera!

And a Spotted Towhee.

And some sparrows.

I turn off the bike path to walk thru Stewart Pond Park... But we still don't have a pond yet. It's still all prairie out here.

But there's a flock of Cackling Geese here, anyway. I'm sure they would prefer to have some ponds here too.

Rain! Where are you, Rain?!

Okay. It's time to figure out who this really is!

I go clear back to the beginning...

I named Henrietta on Feb28, and here's her pic from back then...

This is def the same heron that I saw today. Big blue shoulder patches, plus you can see some of the dark blue feathers underneath her wing too.

And here's a pic of the other Great Blue Heron I've been seeing...

We'll call her Not-Henrietta, for the moment! Very small shoulder patch, and you can see some of the cinnamon coloured feathers behind it too.

And it might be the angle or her stance, but I feel like this heron is a bit more petite, and doesn't have as many of those fancy feathers hanging down at her chest.

Not-Henrietta back in July...

So, she's been around... and been mixed up with Henrietta for a good long while! Ha. It's funny! I'm glad I finally noticed! :)

And yes, I will go back thru the old posts and correct them! (Looks like our first sighting of Not-Henrietta was in June.)

And since I've seen her so many times, and can now identify her in the future, I've decided to call her Knotty!

Knotty is in keeping with the not theme of Not-Henrietta. And when you say it out loud, it sounds like Naughty. She didn't trick me on purpose, of course! But she is def messing with me! *laughs*