Thirteen Things about Leanne, Thursday, May 4, 2006
My other ThirteensThis week I thought I’d let my photography speak for me. Here are Thirteen Macro Photographs I took especially for today’s Thursday Thirteen. If a picture is truly worth 1,000 words, that’d make this entry worth 13,000 words. That has to be some sort of a record!
:winking:

There are 12 more, have a look!

Keep reading »

Daddy Goldfinch

Daddy House Finch

Mourning Dove

This, these birds, this is what my day was all about yesterday. It wasn’t about the demolition. It was all about the babies.

I made phone calls – lots of phone calls, first. I called two places who said they remove and rescue birds. They offered no help and little advice. “Move them to a tree, hope for the best.” No referring phone numbers – except to the DNR, and that guy said “sorry, I deal with fish, try the DoC.” The lady at the DoC about hung up on me, she couldn’t have cared less. No referrals to anyone else who might take them, incubate them, raise & release. Nothing.

So, when I took two nests down from under the carport, I had my fingers crossed for eggs. Brand new eggs, even. I would have carried less guilt that way if the parents never went back to their nests.

The first nest was well built, so when I took it down I started peeking around for eggs. It was built with a false bottom – I swear – eggs started falling out and splattering all over the ground. It broke my heart to throw such a well built nest into the dumpster.

Poor Lisa, she did her best to console me. I was such a mess – especially after I took the second nest down. Babies. Brand new babies. Oh no.

I moved them to a tree our sprarrows frequent. High up into the side of the tree. No luck. Mom & dad just sat there, fretting about where their nest once was.

I made a makeshift ledge out of a wire shelf and put it on the fenceline where they are always perched. They noticed it was there, but apparently didn’t recognize their babies chirping inside.

We waited, and we watched. Both mom & dad kept going to the spot their nest used to be. Mom went down directly below it a couple of times, looking around on the ground – so I put the nest down there. Again, she stood right next to it, but didn’t go in.

 

I put the nest back on the shelf and left them alone for a few hours. When we returned from dinner, it was getting dark – and no sign of mom & dad. My daughter and I were really upset over the impending death of these babies, so I started googling local wildlife rehabilitators. I found a name – called the gal, and she couldn’t take them. She gave me the number of another woman who handles birds and I called her. I was so relieved when she said “bring ’em over!” – I grabbed the nest, put them in a box, and my daughter and I headed over to her house.

I touched one of the babies on the way over – and he was cold. They weren’t moving, either. I asked my daughter to breathe onto them and it didn’t take long before they warmed up and started peeping. We giggled and listened to them peep and watched them open their beaks wide for food. I could tell this was going to be Cait’s thing – she took to them and wanted to care for them, and on the way home she said she wanted to do that all the time. (She’ll probably soon realize that it’s not all fun and peeping, there’s a lot of death involved, and she’ll change her mind like I did.)

The gal that is caring for them is really sweet, and she was so excited to see them all active. She had a heating pad ready and told us we were welcome to call in a few days to see how they’re doing. She seemed confident that they’d be just fine.

Phew. I didn’t realize the level of guilt I felt all day until I got back into the car and breathed a big sigh of relief. They’re going to be fine. We saved the babies!!

(Good job, my little Rescue Catybug!)

This is another photographic portrait that I’ll be using as reference to paint on canvas. Nearly every photo I take is destined for canvas though, if only there were more hours in a day!

This is my doggie Chloe and I, kissin’ in the backyard. Actually, she’s taking a pretzel stick out of my mouth. She’s always been a gentle soul, I’ve never had to worry about her biting my face off.

Thoughts inside my head at this moment, in case you’re wondering:

• OMG, I’m really going to post this picture?
• I’m so impressed that he pressed the button at the right time. Nice job, honey!
• I can’t believe he’s making me post this.
• He’s really not making me post this, he just dared me. I am always up for a challenge. No matter how embarassing.
• I can do it, I can do it!
• Oh jeez, everyone is going to see my ink splotch.
• And my cleavage. Oy! Quit looking!
• I’m gonna hit the upload button…right…here…urgh….crap…okay. Sheesh. It’s done. I did it.
• Actually, this isn’t so bad, because 10 minutes after I saw this photograph, I went and got a haircut. So really, I don’t look anything like this today. Haha!

Also, I had more freaky dreams lastnight, if you want to read about them, visit my Dream Blog.

Finally, a decent shot of this Northern Flicker! Three days later, I finally figure out that he’s living in the hole of a tree right behind our house. No wonder we’ve been hearing so much of him lately!

Guess what I’m going to be when I grow up? (heres a hint)

This is a Northern Flicker – he’s been making quite the ruckus around our trees lately.

I really paid attention to him the other day while I was out washing my car. I heard this monkey like call in the trees and stopped to try to find the source. I couldn’t, obviously he blends in pretty well with the tree bark and they stay pretty well hidden. I heard him again later and he was loud. I caught a glimpse of him on the tree in my neighbors yard, and then tried to identify him by his chirping and what little I saw of him before he flew off.

He’s got a mate, they call back and forth to one another. This morning he was really loud again so I knew he was nearby, and I snuck outside barefoot in my pajamas and got a couple of pics before he saw me. I applied a couple of filters to make him stand out a bit more. He’s a big bird – I’d say he’s about 12 inches.

ATTENTION CHINADAILY USERS: IT IS ILLEGAL TO REMOVE MY COPYRIGHT WATERMARK FROM MY IMAGES. YOU MAY NOT ALTER MY IMAGES IN ANY WAY. PLEASE REVIEW MY TERMS OF USE, AND REPLACE ALL IMAGES WITH FULL IMAGE THAT CONTAINS WATERMARK IMMEDIATELY.

Another perfect capture, in my opinion. We saw this Peacock strutting his stuff from a distance and hurried to be sure to catch him in the act. What is it about their plumage that is so hypnotic? I’m getting very, very sleepy.