Sunday Pic Spam - birds, buds and left-overs.

[curiouswombat]

It's Sunday - it's pic-spam day.

Yesterday I went to see Mum, go out for lunch with her, shop, the usual. And for the first time I actually managed to get a picture of birds at her bird feeders - usually I only have to think of getting the camera out and they all disappear!


Also yesterday D-d arrived home for a fortnight - very tired and in need of a little coddling and cuddling. She drove from York to Heysham and brought Po (her wee car) home - the amount of books she needs to study from over the fortnight would have taken her into excess baggage by air without bringing anything else!

After going to church, she and I went to Tescos and stocked up on healthy food, and then I have done a small amount of garden tidying - so I took some pics of the small signs of life in the garden.

Also, I have been looking at some of my picture files from the past year, especially at some of the pictures that I didn't use as a 'picture of the day', but they are still worth sharing... left-overs! Today I chose three that have lots of green in them - to remind us that there really will be leaves and more flowers soon!

So - click for


Birds - as you can see, Mum simply has bird-feeders pegged to the clothes line -



A goldfinch and a sparrow caught in the act!


Now for signs of spring - out in the yard we have tiny leaf buds unfurling - or just sitting there...

One of the blueberry bushes -



The clematis -



And the pear tree -



Down at ground lever things have been moving - last week I had this picture of one of the hyacinths - this is the same hyacinth today -



These are close ups because they are pretty - and because most of the surroundings are still plain compost and empty pots!


The scillas -



And the Glory of the Snow - which actually waited to flower until the snow was gone...




And now, three pictures from last summer to remind me that, although almost all the trees are still bare, the place will be greener soon.







Taken in early May, mid-June and September respectively.



I'm off work this week - I plan to ... well not do an awful lot really! Go to the garden centre to see if there are any bedding plants in yet, go out for lunch with D-d and Mum - and S2C if he wants to come too, go to Church on Maundy Thursday, finish the current chapter of the Winter Tale, and hopefully finish the whole story, but that might be pushing it a bit!

Comments

[nutmeg3.livejournal.com]

Your corner of the world is genuinely beautiful. I'll probably never see it for myself, so thank you (quite genuinely) for sharing it in your photos. It's gray and chilly here, so your flowers and sun and promise of green are very welcome.

[just-ann-now.livejournal.com]

*is thunderstruck*

Your goldfinches have red faces?

*goggles*(as well as googles)

Ours look like this (http://sdakotabirds.com/species/photos/american_goldfinch.jpg).

(Not that yours isn't a very pretty bird! Just unexpected.)

[kitty-poker1.livejournal.com]

Lovely pics. They make me want to jump on the ferry and head for your beautiful part of the world.

Have a lovely week off, and I hope D-d has a chance to relax properly and put away the books occasionally. Sounds as if she needs the break.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

It's one of the wonderful things about LJ - this chance to see so much of the world - it's sunny today - but not exactly warm yet!

[manoah.livejournal.com]

Lovely, lovely, lovely.

His Lordship is lamenting that we are still not quite to spring yet, despite the daylillies starting to grow. We have snow predicted for Tuesday. Bleh.

I'll come back and look at your lovely pictures if it does!

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

Thank you - I'm planning on not being beautifully relaxed like a lady who lunches!

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

It really is a goldfinch - I actually checked on The RSPB site (http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/g/goldfinch/index.aspx) before I posted! I managed to get him on such an angle that the gold bit doesn't show.

It is fascinating, isn't it, how the European settlers took the names of their familiar birds from home and gave them to local ones, so that we have lots of different birds with the same names. I think your goldfinch is probably more deserving of the name than ours is.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I do guided tours...

D-d's friends have a couple of days out organised and so hopefully she will get away from the books for a little while.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

The flowers are only a small spot in an otherwise pretty bare garden - but, along with the long-awaited beginning of the leaves,they do say 'winter is over'.

But there is snow forecast for Scotland, so not far away.

[kathyh]

Lovely photos. I've never managed to take a successful photo of a bird yet so I'm most impressed.

Have a good week off.

[winsomeone.livejournal.com]

Lovely pics-I quite liked the leftover ones. It's gray and drizzling today, so the green was a nice pick-me-up.

Enjoy your visit with D-d.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I did it with the zoom from about ten feet away - but outside the yard where people often walk along the path, presumably why they were less inclined to take off as soon as I picked the camera out of my bag!

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I thought that little blast of green might be a pick-up for a lot of us.

[petzipellepingo.livejournal.com]

Spring is springing!

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

'Bout time, too...

[cairistiona7.livejournal.com]

Oh, it's so hard to believe it can ever be that *green*, isn't it? Your flowers are looking lovely... I bet the hyacinth smells heavenly!

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

It does smell rather nice. I felt we could all do with a reminder of what green can actually look like!

[jerusha]

Lovely pictures! I hope you have a wonderful week off!

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

Thank you - I just really enjoy not getting up in the morning apart from anything else!

[inzilbeth-liz.livejournal.com]

Those summer pics are most welcome. Spring looks to be coming along in leaps and bounds for you. All the rain seems to have helped a bit hear but there's still not a lot of grass [ever my yardstick!]

[julia-here.livejournal.com]

I was going to say the same thing; it's especially notable since my feeders have goldfinches 1::1 with all other species right now, and one of the other species is the English/House sparrow, imported by the same daft Shakespeare fan who brought us the damned Starling.

Julia, pouring rain right now, and the birds have taken cover

[julia-here.livejournal.com]

I'm a bit ahead of you, although substantially behind most of my neighbors; my pear trees are just today breaking bloom, and the random remnants of abandoned cow pear orchards (that stand where the freeway or subdivisions took out the original farms) have been blooming for a week.

Of course there's double curls of storm systems out in the North Pacific today and I may well have pears when other's do not!

Julia, the trees in the middle reminded me that you are on an island, indeed.

[vilajunkie.livejournal.com]

If only my yard looked like this! It's nice in the spring and summer, but not nearly as nice as yours. :)

[ukamikanasi.livejournal.com]

Pretty flowers! Your goldfinches look quite a bit different from ours. That sparrow is very familiar however-- someone imported them to the US sometime in the past and they are very successful here!

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I think our goldfinch is probably about the most exotic looking bird we see at feeders. It looks almost to flashy for our landscape.