In Our Yards

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Now that spring is well and truly here, our yards are full of birds. Our House Finches have had several babies and both parents and offspring spend a lot of time on our seed-feeders and on our hummingbird feeder. (The latter has only attracted one Ruby-throated Hummingbird this week.)

There seems to be at least one Northern Cardinal in our front yard whenever I look out.

We've even had a pair of American Robins, birds that rarely visit our yards.

The highlight of every day, however, has been visits by a family of Carolina Wrens. The parents take their two offspring on a tour of our yards at least once a day. They lead them from the fences to the feeders and back to the fences by way of most of our hanging baskets and potted plants. Each parent normally watches over one baby but the adult male will sometimes take a couple of minutes off to sing from the top of a fence. A beautiful sound!

The Wrens had three young this year but the other day we found one of the babies dead in our backyard. It was no doubt killed by one of the cats that visit our property.  

Away Again

When you read this, I'll be in Mexico. I have to visit a teacher-training course in Guadalajara, a city that I don't know at all. Although the trip is for business, I've added on one day for birding the local parks. I'll report next week on what I see.
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