Another lovely midday stroll through the botanical garden, noticing many small things. This has definitely become our go-to place, visited as often as we used to visit our little city beach back in Connecticut. We find ourselves checking out some regular spots, like the little patch of sandhills pyxie-moss, which is filling in nicely.
If you will stay close to nature, to its simplicity, to the small things hardly noticeable, those things can unexpectedly become great and immeasurable.
~ Rainer Maria Rilke
(Letters to a Young Poet)
It is always safe to dream of spring. For it is sure to come; and if it be not just as we have pictured it, it will be infinitely sweeter.
~ Lucy Maud Montgomery
(The Story Girl)
We heard a hawk calling and Tim finally spotted it. These were the best pictures I managed to get of it before it flew away. Turns out it was another life bird for me, even though I’ve seen them in captivity before I’m counting this one because it was in the wild.
Whether wheeling over a swamp forest or whistling plaintively from a riverine park, a Red-shouldered Hawk is typically a sign of tall woods and water. It’s one of our most distinctively marked common hawks, with barred reddish-peachy underparts and a strongly banded tail. In flight, translucent crescents near the wingtips help to identify the species at a distance. These forest hawks hunt prey ranging from mice to frogs and snakes.
~ All About Birds website
(looking about the same as they did five weeks ago)
After being delighted to finally get a photo of a titmouse closer to the earth and to my camera, another life bird suddenly came into the picture! What a sweet surprise and wonderful way to end this lovely spring walk.
A common feeder bird with clean black, gray, and white markings, White-breasted Nuthatches are active, agile little birds with an appetite for insects and large, meaty seeds. They get their common name from their habit of jamming large nuts and acorns into tree bark, then whacking them with their sharp bill to “hatch” out the seed from the inside. White-breasted Nuthatches may be small but their voices are loud, and often their insistent nasal yammering will lead you right to them.
~ All About Birds website
Spring has definitely sprung … but I’m looking over my shoulder for winter’s final blast.
I well remember those parting shots from winter up north there! Hope you manage to avoid a final blast.
How nice to see things coming alive for spring time! It will still be a few more weeks before I see much of that around here. I love the bird photos. Long ago I had started a life list but now I can’t remember where it was. I have one going on my Merlin Bird ID app however I have not inputted all the birds I see around me here in the northeast. Where do you keep your list?
During the pandemic I bought a Connecticut birding book with a list in the back of it. I check-marked all the birds that I see all the time and counted them up to get my starting number. Then I started marking the date in the book when seeing a new bird. Most of the birds down here are in the book so I’m still using it. The only one so far, not in the book, is the Carolina chickadee, which I penciled in. A book is easy for me to keep track of in the bookcase. 😉
Sometimes, we are off in a hurry, and we do miss so many amazing nature creations. Your beautiful small finds are fabulous, I love spring springing, it has it’s own artwork of display. And a BIG ‘high-5’ and fancy dance for these wonderful lifers you’ve added! I see the ‘100’ mark coming real quick with spring migration coming and you being in a new area, how exciting, Barbara!!!!
Thank you, Donna!!! One of the blessings of retirement is having so much more time to slow down and pay attention to those simple little miracles in nature. My daughter has been living here for 10+ years now and she says spring is her favorite season by far. I’m already dazzled. It’s kind of amazing how these life birds keep appearing when I least expect it — it’s so much fun keeping track of them. 🙂
You are my story, lol, I’ve been hooked now for over ten years! 😉 Enjoy the adventures! Did you download the Merlin app for your cell phone?
I can see why you’re hooked, it’s so addictive! Now I understand why my mother got hooked in college and dragged us everywhere with her, looking for birds. I did download the Merlin app but confess I haven’t used it much. Learning to navigate apps has never been a strong point with me but maybe I can get Tim to coach me and help me to start making use of it. 🙂
When my son and I were watching the marsh birds on Jekyll Island I was telling him about his grandmother. He was only 15 when she died and didn’t know about that part of her life. He did remember the chickens she kept and how much she loved them and how he helped her feed them when he was little. We marveled at what my mother would think of me now, finally enjoying her passion for myself!
The Merlin app is fairly easy, and I am not so savvy on apps either lol. If you initiate it to listen for birds wen you’re out in quiet areas walking or sitting, the app will tell you ‘who’ is around you that you don’t even realize. It will also give you the tip to what to look for when you record a bird it picks up. 🙂
Wonderful moment with your son, Barbara!! 💞
I will definitely give it a try! We do spend a lot of time wondering what birds are singing away as we walk along. 🙂
Great title and Rilke quote. It pretty much sums up my philosophy of life. 🙂
Thanks for sharing the small treasures you are finding along your way. 💖
You’re welcome, Eliza. 🙂 I’m so glad you appreciated the Rilke quote. Your philosophy of life is perceptive and wise. That mindset keeps me sane! 💕
I’m thrilled that you are noticing so many new life birds, Barbara. Very nice selection of tiny tenders. And you now have a go to place!
Thank you, TD! It’s a very different go-to place from the beach but just as special and beautiful in its own way. I’ve kept my heart open to the possibilities. 💜
Barbara, you and Tim made a wise choice making this your go to spot since you first ventured there after the move. I remember you said you researched and followed this nature nook while you were still in Connecticut. So many lovely little nature gems to enjoy on this excursion and you know them all. The Rilke quote is perfect for these tiny treasures. I am glad you got to see another Tufted Titmouse and also a White-breasted Nuthatch. The Red-Shouldered Hawk was also a find for you, to see in the wild, not in captivity. I’ve only seen Hawkeye, the Red-Tailed Hawk in captivity. There are so many types of hawks and I only get to see the dreaded Cooper’s Hawk, the local squirrel foe. You must be pleased with all these additions to your life bird list!
The botanical garden keeps getting better and better. I signed up for a workshop there called “Small Wonders Small Shifts” and am very curious to see what it’s all about. Another thing I read about while still in Connecticut was the Piedmont Farm Tour next month. Lots of farms are having open houses on Earth Day and I hope we get a chance to visit a few of them. With no cider mills or sugar houses down here it will be interesting to see what kinds of agricultural events the locals look forward to. Hopefully it won’t be too hot in April. I’m glad you appreciated the Rilke quote. 💜 It seems like every time we go to the botanical garden there are different birds to enjoy and identify. I do miss my waterbirds but nature seems to provide alternatives to fill my heart with joy.
That sounds like a fun workshop, with a nod to Earth Day. I haven’t heard of any Earth Day events around here, just a lot of talk about the solar eclipse as southeast Michigan has an area in Monroe County which will have almost 100% sun coverage. I guess it would be fun to see, but I’ll watch it online. I’d rather be on the hunt for Spring unfurling. It’s nice you are seeing so many birds and new ones to you. The botanical gardens where I go is mostly flowers. I’ve not seen any hummingbirds there and only butterflies once, but it’s funny, because not that far from the botanical gardens, also on Heritage Park’s campus, is the community gardens where people pay for a plot of land to grow flowers/produce and the prisoner work detail have a plot of land they grow produce for the food pantry – it is there where I usually see the beautiful Monarchs flitting around the flowers. We need the joy of nature to get through our everyday life and the news in the headlines. It’s a wonderful escape. We had a crummy weekend – rainy yesterday and a frozen precip today and 40 mph winds. Unlike your neck of the woods, we are still devoid of color, so it’s pretty blah landscape.
My son is very excited about that solar eclipse, too. It just so happens that he and his wife will be in Texas for a wedding on that day so they will be in an ideal spot for maximum viewing. Looks like the moon will cover about 3/4 of the sun here so I ordered some of those special glasses and a smartphone photo filter lens. Maybe I’ll get lucky and get a picture with my cell phone. I have yet to see a hummingbird down here, maybe I should get some petunias for the deck. Or maybe they have a feeder at the botanical garden. Sorry to hear you had such crummy weather for the weekend. Too bad you can’t shift your work days around so that you work on the bad weather days and get outside on the good ones. I try to enjoy rainy days by reading, but one can get cabin fever when stuck inside for many days on end… Hope you get some nice spring weather soon. Hang on, my friend, brighter days are coming!
I have a high school classmate who lives in Cary, NC and I think I read she is going somewhere for a viewing like last time. She ordered the special glasses for the last solar eclipse. I just read somewhere, maybe in Birds & Blooms, that petunias would attract hummingbirds, especially the red ones, but I wondered if they get stuck or attached inside those flowers as they are kind of sticky? You can’t lose with petunias as they are always bright and colorful, don’t wilt and easy to deadhead. It is exasperating with the weather, especially when today was gorgeous and also tomorrow as well. That is often the way isn’t it?
The hummingbirds we attracted with our petunias back in Connecticut never got stuck. My fingers always got very sticky deadheading them, though.
That’s interesting because I always hated how they were sticky deadheading them. I had no idea they were hummingbird magnets and petunias are so easy to grow/maintain. They are still going strong in September unlike the impatiens which are often “leggy” by then. Did you plant purple, pink and red to lure the hummingbirds Barbara?
If I remember correctly our petunias were a mixture of red and pink and some with white stripes. I bought a big pre-planted pot of them. I haven’t been out exploring the nurseries around here yet.
That sounds pretty. I have not bought annuals in a while, having bought silk flowers in pots which last about five to six years and look very realistic, but they don’t attract hummingbirds, but they are bright pink in a wooden decorative container and the others are red geraniums in hanging baskets for shepherd’s hooks. I had hoped to lure the hummingbirds to the two feeders.
Geraniums are my favorite summer flowers as they remind me of my grandmother’s garden. But they don’t attract hummingbirds. One pot of petunias did the trick, though, so it wasn’t like having a whole garden to tend to.
That is good to know Barbara. I like geraniums too as they are low maintenance.
Barbara, I have to give you kudos for going the extra mile and identifying the birds and plants that surely must be new to you since your move! That’s a great batch of pyxie-moss, and I like the sweet Betsy, too.
Many thanks, Debbie. I enjoy the mental exercise identifying birds and plants as much as I enjoy just being outside and taking in all the natural world has to offer. My grandmother used to do the same thing with insects, maybe there is a gene at work there. 🙂