Red-bellied Woodpecker

This Red-bellied Woodpecker was recently waiting a turn at the bird feeder.

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A Dogwood blooming in my yard on a recent sunny day.

Bluebird Update

Any time I go out into my back yard now a little head pops up and peers out of the bluebird house. The Mama Bluebird is so cute the way she stretches her head up and looks out with just her beak and one eye to check things out while trying to stay on her eggs.

The Daddy Bluebird is usually in a tree nearby watching. Occasionally Mama Bluebird will take a break from egg sitting and join him on the branches.

"Short Tail"

"Short Tail" the mama squirrel is usually always standing guard close to her nest.

Click on photos for a larger view. I got this picture from underneath her and was surprised at her little bare pink foot. It looks almost like a hand. You can also see a red bare spot on the end of what is left of her tail.

A few more Wildflowers

Here are a few more pictues of the wildflowers near the train tracks.

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Wild Flowers

Wild flowers are in full bloom beside the railroad tracks in Thomasville. I snapped this from my car on my way home from work today. Anybody recognize the place?

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I saw a beak and one eye peering out of the Bluebird house today at lunch. When she flew off I checked the box and there were still just 5 eggs. It will be about 2 weeks before the eggs hatch.

A Visit from an Eastern Towhee

The Eastern Towhee is a large sparrow with black upperparts, hood and upper breast, rufous flanks, and white underparts. Wings are black with white markings, and tail is long and black with white corners. The Eastern Towhee has red eyes across most of its range, but the towhees in Florida and extreme southern Georgia have pale straw-colored eyes.After hopping around in my Jasmine this one decided to take a bath in my neighbor's birdbath.

He appeared to really enjoy himself and seemed oblivious to the female Cowbird taking a drink from his bath.

Short Tail

This little squirrel somehow lost part of her tail so I call her "Short Tail". Without her long tail for balance she has a cute, peculiar little hop so I am always able to recognize her as she scurries around the yard.

Click for larger view She is guarding her nest that is in one of the pine trees in my yard and from the looks of her belly she is nursing little babies.

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Three, Four, Five

I found the 3rd egg on Sunday, the 4th one on Monday and now a 5th one when I went home for lunch on today (Tuesday).

Two Bluebird Eggs

I was begining to think the Bluebirds had abandoned their nest since I haven't seen them recently so I was very surprised to find two tiny blue eggs in the nest when I checked it late Saturday. I will check the nest again on Monday since Bluebirds usually lay 4-5 eggs. During egg laying, the female leaves the eggs unattended and only begins incubating after the last egg is laid.

One more oil drop photo

I took this over the weekend since the bluebirds weren't around. I used a piece of tropical fish printed fabric. If you look closely you can see a tropical fish in some of the drops.

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PLAID DROPS

The sun was out when I got home from work so I managed to get a few quick photos before pollen & other wind blown trash started to contaminate my oil & water. Today I used a brightly colored plaid shirt under the oil drops.

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Where are the Bluebirds? And, oil & water

I don’t know what is going on with the Bluebirds I haven't seen much of them all week. Even yesterday, I was home and able to keep an eye on the box all day but I only caught a glimpse of the female flying off just once. Last weekend they were at the box constantly. Maybe they have decided not to nest in my box.Since the Bluebirds weren’t around for me to photograph I found something else to take pictures of. Here is my first photography experiment with oil, water & colored paper.

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Slow going

I walked out into the backyard yesterday and caught the female holding some grass for the nest as the male flew off but that was the only time I saw them yesterday. I didn't see them at all today but that doesn't mean anything since I spend most of the day at work.

My Azaeleas are blooming.

Sunday Bird Watch

It was so nice outside today! The bluebirds are still busy working on the nest. I mostly got pictures of the male today since he stands guard outside while the female works on the nest inside the box.

Every now & then he goes into the nest box to check out her handiwork. You can see the difference in the coloring on the male (above) and the female (below). He is so much more colorful while she is more gray.I got this shot of the female coming in to the nest. I need to work on capturing this. The bluebirds have some prime real estate. Several other birds have been checking out the box. The Brown-Headed Nuthatches check out the box daily hoping to find it empty. The Black Capped Chicadees want it too. This Mocking Bird would chase the bluebirds away every time they tried to land in the grass.

Saturday Bluebird update.

The male is still keeping watch while the female continues to work on the nest.The female must not have liked this particular piece of nest material. She flew out of the nest with it in her beak. She came back with some different nesting material,I decided to check out the nest after they both flew off. It looks to be coming along nicely.