Acorn Woodpecker

There are typically 15 birds either feeding or waiting on the bottlebrush plant for their turn. But there is a definitely a pecking order. These guys clear the feeders almost as quickly and completely as a hawk. There is a goldfinch hour in the afternoon .The other finches, the nuthatches, tits, chickadees and other small birds come and go. The jays clear the decks almost as quickly as the acorn woodpeckers and there are a couple of  less aggressive kinds of woodpeckers, ladderbacks and downies, that come and go. We're having regular visits from the grosbeaks, tanagers,  thrushes and even occasional sightingsof a rather spectacular bright yellow oriole flashing through the foliage. And the hummingbirds are everywhere, especially at this time of year. Mostly annas, but I'm always on the lookout for a rufous sided one.

We're waiting now for Henrietta to come back with her latest brood.

There are also two amazingly gymnastic grey squirrels who can be seen every morning. 

We buy fifty pounds of hulless sunflower seeds a month for them which is less messy and more expensive. John refills our three bird feeders every other day, teetering on the edge of the deck to take them down and put them back up. We've stopped putting out the hummingbird feeders because there is more than enough natural food for them around here.

It is more than worth it for the natural theatre going on right outside our living room windows every day, rain or shine.

On the other side of the fence there are deer, coyotes, bobcats, skunks, foxes and raccoons. The skunks have been known to get under the fence and Ozzie got skunked twice, but although we haven't seen any around lately, we still escort Spike outside before we go to bed for his 'pee walk' and close the dog door at night. Not that we would be likely to head off a skunk at night anyway but it has become a habit.

I spoke to a woman at Pilates this morning who used to be in class but had a TKR in December. I've looked for her since I started back to class but havent seen her. We didn't get a chance to chat much but she said she is finishing a series of private sessions and plans to be back in class 'soon'. 

Another woman asked me if I had a lot of pain as a friend of her husband's is having 'a lot of pain'. How to answer that question? Of course it is painful, I said, but it is still a source of amazement that I was able to walk out of the surgery center and come home on the same day as the surgery, and that the worst pain was during physical therapy! I was surprised at what a hard question it was to answer.