Today I cleaned and added hummingbird feeders, in anticipation of the Rufous migration (and maybe even a Calliope ❤️?).
As usual, a tiny spider came in on one of the feeders, and I caught it in a cup to return it outside. It was a race to see whether they could get out of the cup before I was ready to rehang the feeders. They won twice.
Lost track; did I show you this one? Unaltered original photo from a #NevadaCountyCA back road, March 2. I think it's the Nature Channel.
Raining hard again. But I did get the bird feeders out for a few hours this morning, and the finches, siskins, jays, woodpeckers, sparrows and kinglet topped up their tanks. So that's good. Now the only option they have is the suet feeder, which doesn't melt or mold in the rain.
Photo: Female Nuttall's Woodpecker framed by the suet feeder hanger. A black-and-white bird with vivid stripes on its head, spots on the sides of its white breast, and bars across its back. (A male would have a red cap, too.)
Nice! All you downhill/downstream water users, you're welcome.
Well, it's hailing here, so we're not done yet.
1/n
Lots of drama yesterday (Mar 2) at the Bald Eagle nest here on our #NevadaCountyCA lake.
Tl;dr -- Nest blew down. No eggs or chicks were there. Adults rebuilding.
This long-standing eagle nest (fledged young in 2021, 2022, 2023) had been damaged in the Feb. 5 windstorm. In the big winds Mar 1-2, a structural branch failed and most of the remaining nest came tumbling down.
Friends alerted me and I headed over to try for photos.
Judging by the contents of the huge pile of sticks on the beach, it looked like a 3-inch-thick branch snapped and sent everything tumbling down.
Now that I have reduced my 2-hour workshop (Gardening for Birds and Butterflies) to 1/2 hour (well "reduced" isn't really the right word, more like comprehensively overhauled) for a local seed swap Saturday, the forecast winter storm looks like it will shut the event down.
But we need the snowpack for summer gardens, so.
And I'm lying about the half hour, that's before I get to the Resources slides. So today I will cut another 5 minutes out, and then wait to see if it was all for naught.
(Photo of flowers on Dutchman's Pipevine. Shaped like tobacco pipes, with wide mouths and bowls. Single host plant for Pipevine Swallowtail butterflies.)
Good morning from the full-moon Sierra foothills! Visitors last night caught in the camera trap. Pretty sure the latter is female. At least, I can't see any male undercarriage. Foxes have been making their bark-yap-chatter noise the past few nights – love is in the air.
Sylvia Wright