Now and Then

 Blogger?? so on the new one how can I set my font so it stays to the one I want and the size I want? Anyone know? And I can't drag and drop photos in the new blogger..there's sliders all over I want only ONE slider or scroll bar...all that that makes it undesirable. So I switched back to legacy in order to make a post. I have a long list of dislikes.  But what's the use? 

Another slow week up to now...

ever get the feeling you're just tracks in the sand?




I took a walk this morning, but with the humidity up again due to the storms in the gulf... my lens was foggy, so I had to edit these photos to get any saturation to show up.

lots of beautiful butterflies finding the fall flowers that line the dirt road, I really enjoyed watching them, mostly they were Little Yellow, and Southern Dogface, Cloudless Sulfur, Buck Eye, and Gulf Fritillary.

The Golden rod is nice right now and many other flowers that I don't know the name of but it's so colorful along with various sedge and grasses.   

The blue herons were at the vernal pool it's sort of low right now but I guess that's how they like it...too far for a decent look but I was happy to see them. 

 Another wonderful thing about this time of year is all the seed heads ready for birds to eat and to reseed the area for next year. Like this tall dandelion...

More seed heads....

The American Crow is out every morning patrolling the area, making sure no hawks are around, these 3 chased away a Red Shouldered Hawk over by the tree line just after this shot was taken...

Still the fires burn, and here we have yet another hurricane breezing through giving us gallons of fresh water...2-5 inches of rain expected today and tomorrow...  

OH I dragged this photo in! Hello. 

I could not sleep last night...no matter how tired my eyes got they would not stay closed...so I brought out one of my old journals written during the Months of July- Sept of 2017.  Roughly 3 yrs ago...My Mom and I were staying at my little sis's empty house  in CO; she had not yet retired and the house sat empty so we enjoyed that time there together before I returned to SC and Mom stayed there with my big sis. 

My favorite tree on the Hill


Photo below taken on 9/6/2017 we were driving up to Maroon Bells, you can drive your own car up if you go after 5 or 6 pm and we had Mom who had be on Oxygen so this was taken on way into the Maroon Bells Wilderness...I looked up some photos of the space and time my journal covered and these are some of the events I had written about.

The Bells in the distance behind the smokey haze being blown in on the winds.

... fire seems to be a regular occurrence about this time of year, this was taken on Sept 7, 2017  Below, from the house on the hill, The setting sun with a smokey haze around it..

 

You can barely see the Hogbacks  on the horizon line 

So I looked for the 17th of Sept 2017, which is today I am wrapping up this post and getting it ready to post tomorrow and this is where I was  on the 17th, 3 yrs ago... Monument Rocks Kansas!

Earth, Wind, or Fire! 

Then on exactly 3 yrs ago today I was at Cheyenne Bottoms NWR in Great Bend Kansas...taking a  photo of this Peregrine Falcon. 9/18/2020  

One more week in September remains! Can you like get your head around that? I almost can not, time is slipping away. 

PEACE

Every day is a new Adventure.

FUNK?

The weather has shifted a little still warm but lower humidity and every now and then even some cool air whisps past me.  I've been playing catch up with a lot of deferred jobs.  My camera is sitting with a dead battery...and I have no desire to charge it, sadly...so I dug thru the archives. 

Jackson lake State Park, in Colorado, I camped under this tree and had about 1,000 gypsy moths invade my van!

It will be time to hang up the yard maintenance tools and drag out the firewood cutting tools..in fact I've already started...some pieces of wood I have been collecting that were long I've been cutting to size.

Still a lot of deer still hanging out in my pasture they bed down out there and you can see the big crop circle where they curl up and sleep..we don't have any of these in the East wish we did..

Pronghorn in the Sagebrush Walden, Colorado 2018

Last Friday my Mom's best Friend passed away (age 96) so I attended her funeral...that was sad.  The line keeps moving of the people I know...it's almost like I can hear some ghastly voice saying, "NEXT". 

This  really upsets me, she has 2 sons..both married.  She was living with one son and his wife had the duty of caregiver...but  as soon as Nettie moved out of her home and moved in with the youngest son, the Older son with  his wife moved into Nettie's vacant house...SO my question is WHY couldn't he have made that move when his mother was there and wanted to Stay in her own  home?  Shame on anyone who does that!! I really didn't want to hug him at the funeral I wanted to smack him!! But I didn't because I know he was  hurting.

yellow throated warbler in the yard June 2011

I have not been motivated to go birding or traveling...I think all the "stuff" Nationally and personally just has me in a vice, I am however enjoying the birds that I see around me, I just have no motivation to go looking beyond my little acres... hope that changes soon as even better weather is expected next week. 

Aug 31, 2011 the day I bought the van

I guess you could say Im in a Funk, remember that word.  Or maybe it's one of those force fields that has a hold over me...I dunno but it stinks. It's like I don't want to go out and see the donkeys without a mask on that makes me angry, and I don't want to see the jackasses with the Trump flags off the back of their pick ups, and 6 ft away is not far enough.  I'd have to drive 3,000 miles to get away from the RED state and the Surrounding Red States! I think election depression is setting in on me.


ruby throated 2011

There was 5 hummers around the feeder a few days ago now I'm seeing only 3 now soon they will be off to their winter feeding grounds!

When I was a kid I used to stomp tin cans on my feet and pretend I was a wild horse..and I was instantly transported to anyplace in the whole world...I want to be a wild horse again...

Yellow Jacket Pass Meeker, CO Oct 2015

Trying to forget the stuff I saw on 9-11 that's why I rarely mention it when the date rolls around -----19 yrs ago ...boy I wish I could erase those horrible memories (RIP💓) but then be careful what you wish for...forgetting is going around.  

Night photography Dec 25th 2015

So this was a slight transgression  of my normal post of My Art, or My Journey but it sure fit the bill of My Life currently.  Hope things in your life are leaning more positive...it gives me something to strive toward..;o)

I am so saddened by all the wildfires in the West people losing the homes they cherish and their sanctuary from the madness that can exist outside that sanctuary.  AND I think of all the animals and birds and how it affects them.  I wish I could send some rain in that direction.  Early snow in the CO Rockies helped with the fires there mostly contained now..

Jimmy is getting good reports on his vet visits and in 2 weeks the cone can come off.

So that's my thoughts this week...just little things stung together.  Share some of yours with me...

PEACE

Every day is a new Adventure.

Sept Still HOT

MY orchard is in the ground...wish me luck.  I will need it, the very first night some leaves were munched off the Apple trees and I saw deer track in the freshly dug soil!  I put yellow caution tape all over them it looks like a murder scene! Fortunately that won't hurt the trees as the leaves will fall anyways I just want to protect the branches.  One of the Apples had a baby coming up in the bucket,  it has a good root system so I  planted it to...so 3 Apple Trees!
We had rain yesterday filled my 30 gallon rain barrel in like 15 minutes! 

 The white thing floats so critters can escape...now it's full I put the lid on to keep skeeters from breeding. 

and in dog gone good news my sister M, is a dog foster parent and she has decided to adopt the current foster she has..meet Nala a super beautiful girl!!



Im so happy! She sounds like an energetic dog who is fun to play with and a great walking pal.  And there is another doggie friend in our world and I think she has made a place in E's heart so now Jimmy (who is improving and getting the best care ever) has a yard mate, her name is Patches, and  I hear she is super sweet, she was homeless and my sis opened the gate and said come on it...

Nala is Doberman and Patches is a Cattle Dog I think,,Both very lucky girls!!
Mom just got 2 new grand dogs! ;o)

This is an immature Male Yellow Billed Cuckoo...I was happy to see 2 of them in the yard.  The adult I could not get a clear shot of...but this young one was visible.

He was sitting at an odd angle with his back to me, so  you can't really see just how long he is! They are actually bigger than a Blue Jay...



And almost at the same time along came an immature Great Crested Flycatcher! Another of the bigger sized yard birds, both of these species are Migratory birds and they will soon be gone! 

You can't see it here but this bird has a lemony colored belly and is a very attractive bird when in full color with those hues of rusty brown and tan, and yellow.

Im suffering for photos so this is just a photo of some of the many cards I have saved over the years...this is all full so now I have a box I'm filling.  I started saving my cards in 2005 but I have some in here much older than that..

I made a quick stop at the Riverside Park, which has been renamed Veteran's Park...they did all sort of improvements that did nothing to make it better for birding...in fact probably made it less attractive to birds.

They made a kayak launch and it says no fishing off the dock but people were...I don't think the County Council that oversaw this project got any community input on how this land could be used...There was picnic tables, now there is only one...there was shady riverside trails now there are none, there was interesting plants and edges, all mowed down.. They improved the entrance, put in all sorts of nursery plants, and yet I think some native plants would have been better and cost less to maintain.
...one especially nice tree that used to be along the forest trail they bull dozed down really made me sad.  It was an old tree that made an arch over the trail. 

Sis and Jimmy Dec 2019 under the arch tree

In the clear cut on my 5 miles has 2  vernal pools and today I saw 2 Little Blue Herons  there  when I drove to do errands, I did not have my camera, but it's a new bird for the clear cut area. 72 species so far. 

PEACE

Every day is a new Adventure.

Last Try

Been hearing a lot of bad things about Blogger lately hope it doesn't begin to give us issues we have enough going on in the world right now to keep us irritated without adding Blog Anxiety to the mix.  I can't barely go near Facebook right now...It's so toxic Id have to unfriend all 29 on my list to not see a political meme, including ME! It's so hard when you  want peace and balance to see our system being abused and misused in the way it currently is, it makes me crazy. I have a feeling this year is going to get much worse before it's all said and done.   

Notice second set of numbers.. 75F with humidity @ 95% and it was not raining when I snapped this shot...with all the tropical unrest going on, the unbearable gulf of Mexico air is being pumped up here by the truckloads as these fronts all 3 of them come in at once..ugh..you literally sweat just standing in one spot.

My left foot still has a redness and some bruising this happened when I was sick with the virus...and it has not completely gone away...it hurts at night more so than when I'm up walking on it..it's not in the joint of the toe its on the side of and the tip of the toe, and the bruise that keeps recurring is on the top of my instep it's so strange...it makes me think  the 'Return of the Jedi'? No please...


female Ruby Throated Hummingbird's are always a blur!

Alberta Peach 

Moving  forward I purchased some Fruit Trees I'm trying for the last time to plant an "orchard" here...I have done this before but honestly you saw how many deer call my little place home...I love them and would never do anything to deter them coming by but I do wish they would stop attacking the trees I plant!  So this time I'm planting the trees in the YARD close to the house...and not out on the acreage ...hopefully even tho they do come in the yard sometimes, Maybe between me and the girls we can keep them from destroying the trees,  they normally do their damage at night! The antler scraping is the trouble. So I will attempt to put guards on the trunks or some caging around the tree so they can't get to the trunk..

I got Peach, Apple, Pear, and Fig Trees...I have one Kieffer Pear that has survived Mom and I planted those only one survived the deer assault....but is not making any fruit because it needs a buddy to get pollination so this new Asian Pear will hopefully do that trick...don't think I got a shot of the Asian Pear...oh well...The Peach is the only one I got in the ground so far...Maybe one per day....Im trying to chart the sunlight they all need 6 hrs of direct sun...


Northern Cardinal

This tomato is one of the heirlooms I grew OMG it tastes like Sunlight so delicious I made myself a tomato sandwich for lunch...And have enough for another one for tomorrow's lunch! Simple things to look forward to..

Carolina Chickadee

Two Brown Headed Nuthatches enjoy some black oil sunflower seed they snagged off the feeder...

One was really hammering that seed open!

...one House Finch in my yard flock has the  conjunctivitis...I won't say whether I caught her or not I will  leave that for you figure out for  yourself, because I saw some people go bat shitz crazy when a lady helped a robin survive...and posted on a Facebook Bird Group page. 

But in the meanwhile I cleaned all my feeders and watering areas with a bleach solution...

In other News Jimmy was taken to Denver on Wednesday, his Surgery was Thursday, my last report was he was very out of it due to the anesthesia, but the vet said he did really well during the surgery, and tomorrow he goes back for a check before  the 3+ hr drive to home.  He has to stay quiet for 5 days and follow up with a local vet...so it's the first big step to a lengthy process to a better life.  I will put an update in the comments section on Friday after I get word on what the Surgical Vet had to say.  The will measure his ocular pressure etc. They shaved his face! And he has to wear this cone for quite some time so he won't try to scratch his face...Hopefully his next photo he will be his old happy self. 💓💓
And:

I'd like to point you to something new I added This week to my Right Side Bar, It's 💝Casey's Find a Grave Memorial Page, please stop by and maybe leave him a flower...I just found out thanks to my sis how to create this memorial page and if you want to do one for your pet and can't figure it out send me a message and I will help you if I can. And this shout out: The day after I created that Memorial my friend ((Jen)) (I Used to Hate Birds)  posted about the loss of her little buddy Jake💕, so sorry Jen, I know how much you loved him and all the fun you had together are memories  you will forever cherish..

PEACE

Every day is a new Adventure.