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Snow-melting Day Bells
A rain chain is a fascinating device. On one day this past week the snow was melting off the roof and provided an interesting set of dribble patterns down our inverted-bell rain chain. I took a set of stop-motion shots and melded them into this ensemble using photoshop elements and perfect-resize.
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Fox Sparrow
A fox sparrow, barely visible among the dead leaves, scratches (backwards!) in the morning sun looking for seeds rejected by the chickadees in the feeder above. What a lovely bird.
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April Morning Warmth
After a long, long winter, she finally finds a warm spot in the morning sun to rest and warm before getting up to forage once again for food among the just-budding plants, bushes, and trees. She watches me closely, listening toward me and behind her at the same time. The sound of my shutter frightens her away. I think she is pregnant.
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VTOL Device in action
Here is is, coming in for a landing, landing gear starting to open, vertical posture assumed, wings back to reverse engines, target sighted. And, somehow, this little miracle VTOL device knows how to feather his wings and drop his tail just enough to allow him to gently grasp the target rail and not overshoot it or crash into the feeder tube. Call it evolution or instinct if you must. I see it as a miracle.
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Slim Pickings
One of the many Dark-eyed Juncos that have been visiting around the bottom of our safflower feeder this past winter week, somehow finding something to eat among what the chickadees feeding above discard. What marvelous little birds, all puffed up for their winter protection. Plentiful, yes. Common, hardly.
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Birds of a Feather?
A chickadee and a Junco share opposite sides of our feeder on this snowy spring morning.
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Sign of Spring
Ms. Cardinal starts to show her first signs of color. So bashful, she can only be captured high up in branches still dead from a long winter. She is hungry, but knows I am down closer to the feeder with my camera.
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1900's stained glass triple window composite
These are old, old stained glass windows from St. Johns Lutheran church in Northfield. They originally were three separate panes. They were recently discovered hidden away in an unlabeled wooden box way up in a dark corner of a third floor banner room in the church, just in time for the sanctuary's 100th anniversary. They were briefly put on display, protected because they are now so fragile. I took pictures of the three as separate shots, corrected the colors in Aperture, and melded them into this triplex in Photoshop Elements. Now they are stored digitally for all to see whenever they want.
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A watchful pause from foraging (see previous photo )
See the previous photo for a description of what these two deer are doing.
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Foraging for dead plants along the endge of the snow melt
We have a cemetery at the edge of our lot where last year's plants from the garden, and some aged house plants, are laid to rest. They have, of course, been snow covered all winter. But with the few days of melt this late spring has brought, somehow two deer have found these remains, and are making good use of them. These wonderful animals are an inspiration for me to do more with my aging life.
