Happy Day!

I had a bad sleep last night with a few wake ups throughout the night not of my own doing.  I found myself getting up around 6:40 AM which is much too early for a guy who only went to bed around 12:30 AM.  I put the coffee on and inhaled it rather quickly.  It was so early and now with the java in my system, going back to bed for some more sleep wasn't going to happen.  I decided to grab my jacket and jeans and go for a walk in a park nearby since owls are on the move now and I'd like to see my first saw-whet or long-eared owl of the season.  Just before I was about to leave, I heard a lot of ruckus coming from the backyard.  House sparrows were screaming and the blue jays were going absolutely ballistic.  I knew without a doubt that there was a predator in the yard; but what?  Or should I say "hooooooooo?"

It took little time looking before I spotted a blue jay almost face to face with an eastern screech owl in the tree near our back gate.  Immediately I asked in my head, "is that Little Al"?

A few blue jays strafed the owl as it sat in this tree.  Occasionally the owl hissed at the attackers.  As you can see, I went back for my camera and took some photos on this dark drizzly morning.  I also tried for a video which isn't easy using a 500 mm lens and no tripod (too early, too lazy are my excuses for not having it out there).

This all lasted for a number of minutes before the owl took flight and went straight into the box.  Seconds later it popped its head out and just stayed there at the edge, looking out and about the yard.  It was Little Al, that I am certain of.

He stayed like this for at least 30 minutes and eventually the other birds backed off, leaving him be, and then Little Al started to relax.  I took the pictures from the deck as I didn't want to add to his stress.  I know he knew I was there but I think he also knows that I really don't pose a threat, especially from this distance.  If you have read my past posts about Little Al, I can go about the yard when he is out there and he doesn't flush from the box or even retreat inside.  He barely looks at me.  Heck, last winter Angie made a snow angel not far from the tree while he sat up there, looking down at her.  I should add that video to YouTube for better sharing.  It was something to see.  How many can say that they made a snow angel in the presence of an owl?  Anyway...

Soon after he disappeared inside.  This is the view now from our kitchen window.  No owl to be seen and no birds screaming at the box.  One would never guess that there's one in there.

Here's to the start of a third year with him visiting during the fall and winter season!  

I should add that he shows up sometime in the fall and hangs out here throughout the winter and into March or April.  He's not here everyday, and last year it seemed to be only on the coldest or crappiest of days.  We could have him for two weeks solid and then he's gone for a week or so.  Then he's back.  He sure keeps us guessing.  We were already talking about him a few weeks ago, hoping to see him again this season and he's granted that wish to us.

I know Angie cannot wait to get home from work and hopefully see him later in the day.

Groundhog Hill

A while ago I discovered an online comic panel called Groundhog Hill on Instagram.  I was searching for raccoon comics, or anything with opossums and skunks, since these are our three fairly regular nocturnal visitors that I admire.

I'm not sure which actual comic first caught my eye but from then I looked further into this and was delighted to find more containing these animals.  They are great single panel comics with one sentence and often bring a smile to my face.  Who wouldn't want that every now and then?

Here are a few samples from Groundhog Hill...

Look, all 3 of the mammal crew in one panel!  LOVE!

My heaven most certainly would have a cute little opossum hanging out with me.

Then there's this one.  Unfortunately some don't see the humor in this as they despise raccoons so much.  Sad.

This one really tugged on my heart for a few reasons.

I do my best to promote Groundhog Hill on Facebook as I have a comic album where I share such things every now and then.

Not all the comics are animal related.

Sometimes you have to look for the animal.  Somehow I missed the raccoon the first time I saw the panel.

And sometimes the animals aren't wildlife.  Fur family members make for great topics.  Our cats do this once the chill sets in the air.  We recently turned on the furnace and both Merry and Molly found vents to lay themselves on.  HAHA!  My mom's cat often laid out like the one shown here.

I highly recommend checking out Groundhog Hill on Instagram.  They are on Facebook as well.  As an added story, if you are still reading this...

The artist of Groundhog Hill had an exhibit in Dundas, Ontario early in the fall.  They live in the area and Groundhog Hill is actually a place nearby.  It is part of their inspiration.  Making a long story short, Angie and I talked about the exhibit and checking it out while we were on vacation during my "birthday week".  Not that I celebrate my birthday all week but we normally take a week off around it as the weather is nice, finally breaking out of the hot humid summer.

Leading up to our vacation, Angie contacted Rose (the artist) and they got talking about us coming to the show.  Rose was delighted to hear this and made sure to be present on the day we were going.  She wanted to meet us as much as we to her.  She's been grateful of my support of her work.  So when we did meet that afternoon, it was wonderful to be face to face, and not "chatting" through social media.

Here we are, and me holding Rose's book that she gave to me as a token of appreciation/birthday gift.  Yay!  I can "visit" Groundhog Hill through the pages whenever I want instead of looking at my phone.  

Rose had an amazing run with her exhibit and it was almost a complete sell out.  We picked up this original, that apparently came to be through some inspiration because of my pigeon posts.  It says "I could do that!".  Hilarious!!!

Angie was wondering if Rose did commissions.  A quick browse of her website and we learned that she does.  Angie had an idea for one and funny as so did I.  Mine was a bench with a raccoon, skunk and an opossum sitting on it.  There was a sign nearby that said "Mueller Sanctuary".  I haven't come up with any one liners and maybe I don't need to.  Angie thought that was a cute idea but liked her's better which is a back view of me and some of our backyard critters.  You know, a pigeon in my hand, a raccoon near my feet and a few other species scattered about.  It would say "Rob and the Animals" at the bottom.  Wow!  I really like that idea.  

Skipping ahead... the commission is complete.  Angie has seen pics of it and teased me over the Thanksgiving weekend by flashing her phone screen past me rather quickly.  I could see well enough that it was the commission but couldn't take in any of what actually was there.  OH MAN!!!  We are planning to meet Rose at the end of the month when we are on vacation again.  So as I key this, we are still a few weeks away from the moment where I get to see it with my own eyes and not just this visual that I have drawn up in my head.  I'm sure I will love it  

Skipping ahead a little more... okay, here we are after the meeting which actually happened a week before vacation due to busy schedules, the commission is at home with us and I LOVE IT!!!!!  What do you think?  Raccoon, skunk, opossum family which I dream of seeing instead individuals (although we did have a mom here the summer of 2022 and the cam caught her with one baby), pigeon in my hand, squirrel in the tree and there's a little owl further up.  Then there's me with my TWC volunteer hoodie and my backyard crocs.  Perfect!

The world can be pretty dark and grim at times; escaping to Groundhog Hill sure is nice when possible.  I think we are going to visit the real place one of these days.

Invasion

As we move through autumn and enjoy what fall migration can bring to our yard, something that is standing out this year is the invasion of common grackles.  We do experience this every year but only a day here, another day there; not like this year where it has been over a week of daily visitors by the hundreds.  Hundreds?  Yes, easily 200 plus I have counted every morning.

It's been loud, crazy and fun.  The only thing is how quickly they decimate my peanut feeders and the food isn't cheap.  What hasn't gone up by ridiculous amounts, eh?

We don't keep many feeders out these days.  I can think back to some years ago where there was at least 7 different feeders scattered throughout our yard.  Right now, there's a peanut ring for whole peanuts, a small metal feeder for shelled peanuts, a small feeder for black oil sunflower and there's a pure suet cake hanging in our lilac for the woodpeckers.

With the mass amounts of grackles, I'm only putting out a couple handfuls of peanuts.  I know they're loading up for their trip south soon, and I don't mind helping to some degree.  There's three other nearby backyards with bird feeders so this also helps them out, and I don't feel so bad about my decision to cut back on the food.

Here's a video from this morning after they all arrived.  I'm trying something new below so you don't need to click on that link.  Hopefully this worked.  I'm not tech savvy.

Yesterday afternoon the grackles showed up again after I put some peanuts out for the blue jays.  I noticed one unique looking grackle in the flock.

It was hard to stay on this bird since there was so many grackles out there and they all flushed in a flash fairly regularly for whatever reason.  It would be many minutes before they all started coming back one by one and eventually this bird would appear.  I've been keeping watch this morning for him to reappear but so far he hasn't.  He's cool and funky looking!  I thought about that quote... 

"They laugh at me because I look different.  I laugh at them because they all look the same."

His appearance made me enjoy the invasion a little more.

I know with the mass numbers of these birds here, that they've pushed other species away.  I've seen white-throated sparrows who normally stick around in the fall for a few days if not months but all have left soon after being seen.  Dark-eyed juncos are usually here in small numbers by now and staying.  Again, just one offs for a very brief bit and then gone.  Both ruby-crowned and golden-crowned kinglets made shorter than usual appearances.  I was happy when a white-breasted nuthatch showed up the other morning but he too didn't stick around once these guys showed up.

I don't hate these birds by any means but after over a week of steady appearances in such numbers, I won't be sad to see them move along on their journey south soon.  Unless I win the lottery this week.  HAHA!

Missing Gulliver

I haven't seen my pigeon friend Gulliver since the Labor Day long weekend.  I miss her.  I have made a lot of pigeon friends in the last 11 years but some really touch me more than others, where we have a unique bond, and our encounters aren't all about just me being the guy with the food in his hand.  Gulliver was one of them.

She tolerated me and all my selfies over the last 2 years.

All I ever had to do with her most days is hold out my hand and she would come right to me.

The last number of months I always looked out for her.  More so than usual.  I didn't really think as to why but I am now aware that she effected me emotionally.  They all do, but she did more so.  Seeing her and having those moments every day made me a little happier.  I didn't realize that until her disappearance.  If that makes sense.  And add that every time she showed up in the yard on a weekend and I wasn't near the window to spot her, Angie would let me know that Gulliver was outside.  Quite often my breakfast or dinner got a little cold as I went out to see her before I ate.

The first days of her disappearance, I held out hope every morning that she would return.  After 10 days or so, I silently mourned the loss of my friend.  She's still in my thoughts quite often while I am outside.

I have reminded myself how Pierre disappeared for 60+ days a few times during the winter months.  Charlie goes away for even longer spells, up to 5 months.  She's been away all summer but has recently started showing up again.  Maybe this is Gulliver's turn to pull a disappearing act?  It just wouldn't be like her to do so after over two years of visiting; but then again it wasn't the other birds thing to do until they did it.

I have learned to take in the good moments with our wild friends because you never really know when may be the last time that you see them.  So many pigeons before her have left one day and didn't return.

Thinking back to the last day with Gulliver, the air show at the CNE was ramping up for the long weekend.  The Blue Angels were flying very low over our neighbourhood every afternoon.  They were so loud too!  Their fly overs would spook the birds.  I took this photo from the park right by our home.  I had full zoom on the 500 mm lens but the image is not cropped.

On top of the loud scary jets, there was one or two cooper's hawks in the neighbourhood because it is their migration time, and they were chasing all the birds here.  I found a few piles of pigeon feathers in the yard.  Thankfully none matched Gulliver's.  Of course I feel sorry for the ones that ended up becoming lunch to a hawk but I also accept that this is their wild way of life.

Do I think that a hawk got her?  I'd like to think that was not the case.  Gulliver's mate is missing as well along with some of the others in that flock.  A couple of the others that we have named, are also missing now.  After that "scary" long weekend for them, a bird we call Gandalf went from daily appearances to one or two visits a week and is now MIA for a few weeks.  Another named Buzz, similar to Gandalf.

Anyone remember the pair that I called the Jerseys?  Them, along with Mrs Pierre, and a bunch of others all flew away one fall day and never came back.  I believe that they had enough of the cooper's hawk attacks and went to a safer feeding place.  The last week they were here, they were on edge, and their visits were no more than 2 or 3 minutes before being spooked away.  Pigeons are much smarter than what many people believe.

Fingers crossed that she surprises me one day with her return.  

Here's a handful of pictures of her if you care to see a little more of her and our times together.

Fun at Halloween.  I know I have some Santa hat Christmas shots somewhere that I could also share.

Playing in the fall colours.

Enjoying one of the first really nice days of spring.

Cold winter days with some snow made for fun photo opps.

I swear she got jealous when I wasn't "focusing" on her.  HA HA!

She really is a beautiful bird to behold and obviously stood out from the flock.

Our message to the pigeon haters of the world...

Have you ever befriended one of your backyard visitors?  Please share in the comments if yes.  I'd love to read about them.