The past week, abbreviated

It has been a busy week with my work projects ramping up again, and lots of hours spent at my desk.  Here's a quick synopsis of the past week though, mostly from last weekend.

I did some new raccoon proofing of my bird feeders, because I was tired of this (my picture from 2017, we don't have leaves out here, yet!):

The seeds were disappearing at a great rate and the poles I had in place were often bent, which was getting very frustrating. I had a regular raccoon problem with several visitors - caught groups of up to 6 of them feasting some nights. I determined that my baffles on the shorter feeder poles weren't working in some cases because the raccoons could grab the undersides of hanging feeders.

So, I bought a metal ground spike for a 4x4 post, and a 7-foot long 4x4 post. I installed the post using the spike, and then slid 3 lengths of stove pipe over it. I used the 7 inch circumference pipe in 2-foot lengths. I read that some raccoons have successfully climbed 6 inch circumference pipe, so I decided 7 inch would be best. After the pipe was in place, I had a foot of the post exposed at the top, to which I added cross-pieces to hang the feeders, with little grooves for the hangers to keep them in place in the wind.

It's been a week and no more raccoons. My seed is lasting much longer, my feeders aren't getting dragged into the woods, and the birds are happy. I do still have one pole with my original baffle that has my tray feeder. I think it doesn't hang low enough for the raccoon to grab it, so the stove-pipe baffle is still effective on that post.

Speaking of bird feeders, the number of birds over the past week has been incredible. I've routinely had at least 15 American goldfinches at the feeders, with several purple finches, juncos, pine siskins, blue jays, grackles, mourning doves, and white throated sparrows as well. It's been very busy for them. I also have a pair of robins who started to build a nest under my eaves but the bits blew down in the wind so they may choose somewhere else.

Here are some synchronized goldfinch feeding team tryouts.

The female goldfinch is impressed, I think.

A whole lot of pine siskins with goldfinches in the background.

My running class took place on Tuesday and Thursday. I didn't go on Tuesday because it was snowing. Sometimes I really dislike our climate! More spring already! I went on the elliptical machine in the basement instead.

I did go on Thursday, even though it was raining. Marginally better than snow.

Our running takes place in the Sackville Waterfowl Park, but I can't take my camera for the runs, so I made another visit to the park with the camera last weekend. I was pretty excited to see a common gallinule, which is not at all common for this area. Here he is peeking out of the rushes.

All the way out!  Look at the colour of his legs - so vivid!

A lovely treat to see this unusual visitor.

This coming weekend is a long weekend here in Canada, but it looks like it will be raining for most of it. I'd like to get out in the garden soon but it's been really cold, and we had a frost warning yesterday, so it's too soon for most things. Fingers crossed it will warm up soon.

Friday's Hunt v 3.22

It's time for Friday's Hunt again.  Today I am hunting to find time, as usual.  It has been a crazy busy week with working until midnight most nights.  I have a bit of respite from work this coming weekend but the weekend itself is busy with cleaning and organizing my former home in Nova Scotia to get it ready for the real estate market.  Then it will be back to the grind on Monday.

Fortunately, I managed to take a few pictures for today's hunt.  The prompts from Eden Hills are:

Starts with V
Vermin starts with V.  The term vermin usually refers to animals or birds that cause a significant nuisance.  This little raccoon probably falls into the vermin category in the minds of most people.  It is a significant nuisance because he (or she) eats my bird seed and damages the bird feeders.

On the other hand, I think this is a really cute example of vermin, despite it being a nuisance.

There's a look in its eye, as if to say "What....I wasn't doing anything?  Why are you staring at me?"

See?  I'm just doing my exercise routine.  Nothing to do with the suet feeder.  Nope.

Usually this little vermin visits after dark, but on a very wet and rainy day earlier this week, he/she was there earlier in the day while there was still light for these pictures.

Week's Favourite
My favourite picture this week is courtesy of Mitten, our cat.  He was nestled in the shelving unit inside our closet - when Marc opened the closet door, he found Mitten comfortably sleeping in there. He called me up to take a picture and Mitten stayed in place for this cute shot.

Here's the overall view of how he looked when the closet door was opened.  Funny cat!


Inch
I'm excited to say that it is moth season again!  I'm always interested in taking pictures of moths that visit our screened-in porch.  I leave the light on overnight and it tends to attract moths who rest there and I photograph those that remain in the morning.  This moth has wings that are just about an inch across (from top to bottom as seen in the picture below).  It is the Northern Thorn moth (Selenia alcipherea) and it visited my porch this morning.  Hooray for the start of moth season!

Friday's Hunt v 3.17

Here we are....I have no idea where the week went, but it's Friday again!  This has certainly been a busy one.  I hadn't thought about the blog all week so I had to do a bit of quick thinking this evening to get my ducks in a row.  Our prompts from Eden Hills are:  Starts with Q, Week's Favourite, and Evening.

Starts with Q:
Q is a tricky letter, but I decided to talk about quilts.  I have made a few quilts over time, although I haven't made any lately.  I made a quilted wall hanging many years ago that I recently found when I was unpacking some boxes of things that had remained packed for many years of moves.  I'd like to put it up on the wall again somewhere.  It needs to be washed and ironed since it is all wrinkled from its storage time.  I like the colours in it and the shapes.  It was a sort of random quilt hanging that I put together in a short time frame, just for fun, so it isn't perfect.

Last year (2016) I decided to do a block-of-the-month quilt project.  I decided it would be good to make a quilt block each month and give myself a craft project to look forward to each month.  I bought all my fabrics and I was really excited about proceeding.  In January of 2016, I made the first two of 6 pieced triangles required for the January block.  I realized that I made a mistake and that the two orange small triangles in the left triangle panel should have been overlapping, like they are in the triangle on the right.  I decided I needed to fix that before continuing.  That's as far as I got on my project.  The rest of the year, I was unable to continue due to us trying to sell Marc's house, having things in storage, and then not having the space yet set up in the new house.  I thought I'd start again this January.  It's April.  I haven't gotten to it yet.  Someday...

Week's Favourite:
I managed to get some really cute shots of the red squirrel last weekend.  I think that it might be a nursing or pregnant female.  In this shot, you can really see her teats, which I don't think I've really noticed on a squirrel before.

I also noticed something else that I hadn't noticed before - she appears to be shedding a winter coat.  I didn't know squirrels did that, or at least not as noticeably as this.  You can really see the line where the winter "fluffy" coat is shedding, just behind the foreleg.

Here are a couple more of my favourite shots from my squirrel photography session!

Evening:
I had to think quickly for this one.  I don't often take evening pictures.  But let me tell you a little story about a few evenings ago.  I heard a fearsome growly-squealy noise outside, and I went to peer out the window with the aid of the standing lamp in the home office.  A raccoon was hanging off the bottom of my bird feeder and swinging on it.  This was the culprit who has been bending my feeder pole over time.

A couple of mornings later, I came downstairs to the home office to enjoy my morning coffee.  I looked out the window.  "Hmmm," I said to myself, "that's interesting.  I'm quite sure there used to be a bird feeder there."  That was when I realized that raccoons not only have an interest in the contents of bird feeders, but apparently they have a desire to take them to their little raccoon homes and possibly use them as decor items, because clearly, my raccoon had carried it off somewhere.  I have wandered through the woods looking for it, but to no avail.  He left the lid, which we had replaced after he chewed through the plastic one.  The tube that held the seeds has entirely disappeared.

He has also displaced the screening from the tray feeder, which you can see hanging down in this picture that I took this evening.

I need a taller pole, not to mention adding a raccoon baffle to it.  In other news this evening, the bunnies are resting comfortably.