Sometimes our bird feeders attract unintentional visitors. I’m not talking about mammals like deer, bear or squirrels. I’m talking about birds that are looking for food but not the wild bird seed variety. These birds – hawks – are looking for other birds for their meal. My husband and I were sitting on our deck
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Happy First Day of Spring, otherwise known as the Vernal Equinox, which means that the sun is directly above the equator and the hours in the day are divided equally between daylight and darkness. Here in the northland as we near the end of March, the promise of spring grows louder each day for us
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The seed catalogs have been arriving like clockwork for the past month and it is delightful to look through all the beautiful and colorful pictures of flowers and vegetables at a time when the ground is covered by two feet of snow. We can paint images in our brains of warmer days and the bounty
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Here are some unexpected or little known benefits that birds provide for us and the environment. Maybe you’ve heard someone say, “What good is a _____?” Insert the name of an insect, mammal or bird. For people who are not interested in nature these other creatures that share the earth with us may just seem
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February was designated National Bird Feeding Month on February 23, 1994 by Congressman John Porter. This is a portion of what he had to say, ‘‘I would like to recognize February, one of the most difficult months in the United States for wild birds, as National Bird-Feeding Month. During this month, individuals are encouraged to
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One of the challenges of winter life in many parts of the country is periodic storms that bring precipitation in the form of freezing rain and ice. It makes for dangerous driving and walking conditions. We live in Minnesota and thankfully see fewer ice storms than states to the south, but inevitably ice will form
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Throughout our lives we develop new traditions over the Christmas holiday season; some with our families, some with friends, and some for our own pleasure. A new tradition that can begin at any age is to join a Christmas Bird Count (CBC). The time frame every year is between December 14th and January 5. Begun
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