The Days

This is such a good time of the year. We have one set of guests at the moment and Teresa and Jax are out hiking with them. I like to sit on the porch for half an hour each morning and observe. The white crowned sparrows eat at one feeding location. The house finches at another and the black eyes juncos at one more. The Eurasian doves go back and forth as do the most populous bird right now the red winged blackbirds. They live in the reeds of the pond next door. The day they leave in late February the cow birds en masse will show up and take their places both feeding and nesting. There has been a canyon wren bouncing around on the porch for weeks looking for a place to live and finally last week a second one showed up and they are hanging around together. The bird I've felt the worst for is the single pinyon jay who comes every day by itself but even it finally found a mate this week. For the last couple weeks three skunks have come to the porch. Jax got sprayed by this one twice last week. We came back from hiking yesterday and Jax walked through the door and two seconds later came right back out. Five seconds later the striped skunk come out of the kitchen.