All the same as usual around here, really

So, the state of emergency continues around here, and I know it probably sounds unusual, but things around here are more or less the same as usual.  I've been working from home for 8 years now, and I'm continuing to work from home.  I haven't lost any clients and I'm lucky to be busy...even though sometimes I'm too busy.  I work 50+ hours a week, and that's more than enough.  I typically shop for groceries once every couple of weeks, and I'm still doing that.  My stores have had most of the things I want, although there was a short supply of toilet paper for a while, but I had plenty on hand already.

My province is in an official state of emergency, with no public gatherings, no non-essential businesses being open, schools closed, and all the other usual things that everyone is dealing with now in 'lockdown' situations.  We also have closed provincial borders.  I can't visit my parents in Nova Scotia, nor can they visit me.  The provinces are like states in the United States.  I'm not sure how many states have their borders with other states closed.  Not enough, I'm sure!

All our provincial efforts are paying off.  We've had a total of 117 cases of COVID-19.  That's across the whole province!  77 of those cases are recovered.  So, we only have 40 active cases now.  A total of 12 people have been hospitalized, but we now only have 5 people in hospital, 3 in ICU.  We have had zero deaths in my province.  Not a single one.  We had an early, rapid shutdown response with fairly consistent abiding by the rules by most people.  We are very lucky, but if everywhere had taken such strict, early measures, things would probably be a lot better all around the globe.

I really haven't been particularly worried or stressed, and I'm still not, especially given how well our province is doing.  We're not out of the woods yet, but they say that the economy may soon start to open up again if we continue to have such low numbers.  For the past couple of weeks, our daily new case number has been 0, 1 or 2.  It goes to show that obeying the rules and acting responsibly really does flatten the curve.  We also have a relatively low density in our urban areas, and a lot of people live fairly rurally, which helps keep distancing easy.

I have been going for walks in the local park (where the trails have been made one-way only to support distancing).  I saw a muskrat on the weekend!

I'm also keeping busy with my usual things around the house, including some crocheting on my Sophie's Universe blanket.


The snow is still in the yard but it's melting and a couple of the raised beds now have no more snow on them.  I have some crocuses that are blooming in the flower bed that gets the most sun.  Some of the other flower beds are still completely snow covered.

I turned 51 last weekend.  It was a bit sad not to be able to visit my parents for my birthday, but it's for the best until things are safer for them and for me.  Marc baked me a cake, which was really sweet of him, and it was extremely yummy.

In other news, I set up the incubator to replenish some flock members, and the first chicks hatched today.  They are darling, as one might expect.  Let's hope for lots of hens!

Also this week, the moths have finally started coming back.  I'm using moth bait this year, which is a mix of brown sugar, molasses, yeast, red wine, and fermented apple pieces.  It's working really well.  So far, I've had a lovely mix of spring species.  I'm really happy to be mothing again.

Wanton pinion moth (Lithophane petulca)


Straight-toothed sallow (Eupsilia vinulenta):  one specimen with orange spots and another with white spots.  I find this kind of diversity within species to be quite fascinating.

Hoary pinion (Lithophane fagina)

Dot-and-dash Swordgrass (Xylena curvimacula)...doesn't it look like it's wearing an evening gown?!

Plush-naped pinion (Lithophane pexata)

So all in all, things are just about normal around here, and I'm really glad I am a bit of a quirky introvert with hobbies that allow me to stay home and amuse myself, and I'm really glad to have a home-based career.  Hope everyone in my blogosphere is staying healthy and calm.  Carry on!

Weekend Roundup: S

The prompts for S from Tom the Backroads Traveller are: Starts with S, Favourite, and Silver.

Starts with S

Here is a pair of American goldfinches at my feeder.  

Why, you are probably asking, am I showing a goldfinch, which starts with G?  Well, their scientific name is Spinus tristis, and that starts with S!  The male American goldfinch puts on a beautiful coat of yellow feathers in the spring, and then they go a sort of dull greenish-brown during the winter.  I think their summer coat looks like sunshine!  The female is less bright, but she also puts on more colour in the summer than in the winter.  Obviously, she's the upper bird in the above photo.

This male is nearly finished moulting his winter feathers, but you can still see the remnants of his winter coat on the back of his head and the top of his wing.  The one in the picture above no longer has those brownish feathers.

The Spinus genus of birds includes the goldfinches (but not other finches) and a whole lot of siskin species.  Occasionally I see a pine siskin, but not as often as I'd like!  The name for the Spinus genus of birds comes from the Ancient Green "spinos" which is apparently a name for a bird that is no longer known or identifiable.  Meanwhile, "tristis" is Latin for sorrowful, because apparently some people think their song is mournful, but it doesn't sound that way to me!

Favourite

Spring really has "sprung" here and my crocuses are in full bloom, so I took this picture this week of a favourite patch.  I love this little group of blossoms because there are purple ones, white ones, and also the white ones with the purple veining.  They are so cheerful and remind me that summer is on the way.  I have a couple of patches of yellow ones also.

I also noticed some tulip buds are forming!  Hooray!

Silver

I am trying to go for regular walks these days, at least when it isn't raining.  On my 1-hour walk circuit, I go past the end of a lake.  The lake is called Silver Lake and it is a lovely view as I go by.  As you can see, things are just starting to turn green around here, but none of the leaves are out yet.

At a different part of the lake, during the summer, there is a swimming area set up (with a barrier to keep kids in the safe area) and there is a boat access ramp.  People go trout fishing on the lake as well.  It is very irregularly shaped, as shown in the map picture below.

I enjoy looking for the loons that are sometimes at the spot where I walk by.  Unfortunately, since I don't take the larger camera with the zoom lens on my walks, I don't get good pictures of the loons.  If you look closely at this shot, you'll see a tiny black and white blob in the middle. That's a loon. Really!  Trust me!

Weekend Roundup: N and O

I missed the Weekend Roundup blog last weekend because I did an extensive post on Epinette's battle with pneumonia last week.  She is still sneezing but we hope continuing to recover.

I'll catch up now with letters N and O.

Night
I don't usually take pictures at night, and I kept forgetting to take one these past couple of weeks.  I remembered that back when I was learning how to use the camera, I took some pictures of the moon.  I don't remember the settings - I would need to study that again.  Here is a picture of the moon from September 16, 2016.  One of my relatively few night shots.

One
There is still snow on much of my yard.

I have one garden bed that is now uncovered, because it receives more sun than the others.  That garden bed has two patches of crocus that have come up, which make me very happy.  Spring is coming!  One of the crocus patches only has one flower.

I'm still happy to see it!

Starts with N
My parents visited this past week, which was a lovely treat.  My mother pointed out that I had what looked like a nest on my roof.  I thought it was just some old twigs that got stuck on the ice blocker strips.

On closer inspection, it turned out to be two nests!  I am sure that they are from last year and they just need to be removed, otherwise they will block the gutters.


I took this picture from the upstairs window looking down on them.

Starts with O
This is my black copper maran hen - her name is Onyx.  She lays the darkest egg of my flock.

Favourites
During my parents' visit, we went to the waterfowl park - a favourite walking spot.  I took this picture of a male American Robin on the walk.  I think his mate was collecting nest materials so he was keeping an eye out while she was busy.  He followed along beside us for a while.  This shot has shadow on his wing but I still really like the picture.

Keeping with the bird theme, I was also really pleased with this recent shot of a purple finch who was visiting my feeders.  They are such vividly coloured birds.

Friday's Hunt v 3.16

Another busy week for me, but I managed to get myself organized for Friday's Hunt with Eden Hills. This week the prompts are:  Starts with P, Week's Favourite, and Feet (or foot).  

Starts with P
P is for pink!  This is the first non-crocus flower that has begun to appear in my garden.  It is the flower of Daphne mezereum, which has a common name in some places of February Daphne.  It would be really nice if we had flowers in February here, but we don't.  So it's April Daphne to me!  Also, the flowers are in a format that is called a panicle.  A panicle is a group or cluster of flowers, rather than a single flower form. You often see panicles on grass crops like oats.

Daphne mezereum is native to all of Europe, as well as the Caucasus, Turkey, northern Iran, and parts of Siberia.  It is very hardy, which is why it does well here. The flowers come out first and the leaves will follow later in the spring. Unfortunately, all parts of this plant are very toxic, so I need to be sure the goats and sheep never get to it!

P is also for purple.  The purple crocuses are really spectacular now - in large groups and sporting their lovely orange stigma - the bees love them at this time of year.

Week's Favourite
So, I was very excited today because I finally (FINALLY!) got a picture of an owl.  I had it in my head that today was the letter O, and I thought it was just perfect.  Then when I went to check the prompts, I realized that today was letter P.  So, my owl picture has become my week's favourite.  I have been trying for many weeks to take a picture of an owl.  I keep hearing them in my woods and even wrote a separate blog post about the owls thwarting my efforts.  Today, my effort finally paid off.  I was actually helped by some crows who were mobbing this poor owl, so they tipped me off to its location.  I had been hearing a barred owl in the woods, but this one is actually a great horned owl. It was very high in the tree, and there were a lot of intervening branches, so it was a difficult shot, but at least it's recognizable.  I hope to get a better picture in the future.  The owl was watching me and I knew it was already upset by the crows, so I didn't want to stress it out even more.  I took my picture from a distance and thanked the universe for such a wonderful gift.

Feet
Today I took a picture of Marc's feet.  He was up on the ladder working in the garage, so his feet were at my eye level.  That made them a convenient photo subject!

He is continuing his work on the outbuilding that will become his workshop.  Today he was installing two lamps that will be over a workbench.  They are vintage lamps that he purchased at an antique shop.

Hopefully they will be just what he needs for proper illumination.  Bulbs will help, I'm sure!

Friday's Hunt v 3.15

Today has been a vacation day for me - I decided not to work today, so I have enjoyed a somewhat relaxing day so far.  I was also able to think about my Friday's Hunt post a bit more than usual these days!  What a treat to have a day that I didn't do any work at all!

Our prompts from Eden Hills this week are:  Starts with O, Week's Favourite, and Blossom.

Starts with O
Last weekend I spent the weekend at the Maritime Fibre Arts Retreat, as I mentioned in my last blog. It was held at a hotel that looks out over the ocean.  I live near the ocean but we don't often make a special trip to see it.  There are not very many beaches here - it is a very rocky coast.  Here you can see that the ocean was very calm by the hotel grounds, but it is not always that way.

Sometimes, the ocean is very rough - here you can see that a lot of rocks have been thrown onto the land as a result of heavy surf in the winter storms.  These are along the front of the cabins at the hotel, which are separate from the main part of the hotel.  The groundskeepers will probably clear all the rocks and throw them back into the ocean because it will be hard to mow the grass with all those rocks there!

The hotel looks out over to Oak Island.  This island has many famous legends associated with it, mostly pertaining to buried treasure.  This is a picture of the island, just off the coast.  On the right side of the picture, you can see it is connected to the mainland with a small causeway.  You can also see it in the first picture I posted.  There is a recent television series - The Curse of Oak Island - created by the two brothers who now own the island.  I haven't seen it - I don't watch TV.  It is privately owned but there are tours on occasion in the summer.  I doubt there's any hidden treasure there, but I suppose you never know.  They have found some interesting artifacts there.

Week's Favourite
My favourite picture this week is my little chipmunk friend!  I haven't seen him (or her) since last fall, so I was ever so happy to see those stripes again this week.  I saw the squirrels all winter, but not a sign of the chipmunk.  Hooray for spring!

Blossom
Finally, the snow has melted away from one of my garden beds.  That was just this past week because we had quite a few days that were warmer than usual for this time of year.

I was thrilled to see my first actual blossoms in my yard today!  Here are some crocuses that have opened today.  I didn't plant these - they were already here.

We moved into the house last June, so by then, the crocuses were already finished for the year.  I wasn't sure what spring bulbs might already be in place, so my mom and I planted a whole load of tulip and daffodil bulbs last fall.  We didn't plant any crocus though.

I am so glad to see their happy little blossoms brightening my spring garden bed.  Soon the tulips will be pushing their way higher.  I can see a few emerging already.  I also saw these little green spikes emerging today.  I'm not sure what they are, but I thought it was interesting that the shoots have gone straight through the brown leaves from last year that had fallen into the bed.  They are very determined little shoots!

The bed on the other side of the house is still partially under snow.  I'll be looking forward to more blossoms in the coming weeks as the rest of the snow melts and things begin to grow in earnest.