I’ve been trying our trail cam out in different locations, with varying success. Of the trees in the area, some are too large for the elastic cords used to hold it in place, but I had smaller ones, so I tried different fence posts. Finally, I tried other tree that were smaller but were also growing at quite a bit of an angle.
I’ve since moved it back to where it’s been for almost a year, though the files I went through this morning are from being on one of those leaning trees. It had a bole I could use to level the cam out a bit. Unfortunately, I found it was a bit too close to get a full view of both the gate and the outside of the driveway. Plus, one of the fence posts was right in the view. It’s one of the posts that’s rotten at the bottom, so the only thing holding it upright is the barbed wire. The wind would shift it, causing it to trigger the camera.
I did get a very pleasant surprise, though!!
An excellent video of a bird that landed on the post! There’s a second one on the wagon wheel in the background.
The bird was digging into the rotten top of the post.
Where it found something to eat!
I look forward to when we can set the trail cam up at the feeding station by the house. I just love shots like this!!!
Today was a statutory holiday, and the pharmacy my daughter works at is closed for those, so my daughter had the day off. We still made a quick trip into town, as there was a festival going on. It was the market we wanted to check out, after I mentioned some of the vendors I saw. Unfortunately, half the market wasn’t set up today, so it was a bit of a wasted trip.
Except we got churros. Which makes up for that. These are a once a year thing, so it’s a really special treat. :-D
Another treat we had was when we got home and found the little furry bean, lying in a sun spot.
Is this little guy gorgeous, or what?
While things are starting to cool down, it still wasn’t until evening that I headed out into the yard to water a few things. I was pleasantly surprised to see Guildenstern coming into the yard with her baby.
After watching them for a bit, Junk Pile Kitten ran into the lilac bushes, so I settled myself on the steps at the door on that side and watched.
I was not disappointed.
What a beauty! Just look at those eyes!
He came pretty close to me, playing with a couple of the sun room kittens that came by. Including his brother, Keith. :-)
I was able to get a bit of pruning done in the yard. Some of it was getting rid of low hanging branches that were starting to hang too low. Some of it was in the lilac near where I’ve planted the haskap berry bushes. Some of the branches were hanging low enough to be all stabby at me when I try to mow around the bed, but most of what I cut away was dead branches, twisted among and around the live ones. That opened the bush up quite a bit.
The kittens immediately took advantage of that.
There was 4 of them in there, at one point! :-D
As I was hauling the branches off to the wood pile, my husband went around to get some photos of the sun going down through the trees. We could see a cat off by the pump shack. After putting the wheelbarrow away, I decided to see which cat was out there, because Beep Beep has been pretty vicious about chasing Rosencrantz off in that direction.
It was, indeed, Rosencrantz, but I had another pleasant surprise, too.
She and her baby are using the pump shack again! It looks like the little guy can squeeze himself through that hole in the bottom of the door.
The hole was not that big before.
He is such a dark grey little kitty!
The other kittens came around, and he did play with one of them that came over, a little bit, but for the most part they stayed away from each other.
I’m really glad they have stayed nice and close. I hope Pump Shack Baby will make friends with the sun room kittens and start coming to the house for food.
I may not have gotten a lot of work done outside, but seeing the two other kittens is enough to make up for that. :-D
My husband passed the furry little bean off to me this morning, while I was at the desktop. Dave promptly curled up in a ball and fell asleep on my chest, making the most interesting nose noises.
He then abruptly stood up, clambered up my shoulder, leapt across the chasm to my bed, and snuggled up to Fenrir.
He burrowed right into her fur and went back to sleep.
She didn’t even open her eyes.
That didn’t stop him from stretching out and luxuriating.
And twisting himself into this weird shape. That’s his bottom leg curled up in front. It’s like his head is coming out from under Fenrir, rather than attached to his body. :-D
Also on my bed was this furry black mama orb.
She typically ignores our new addition, but has been getting more accommodating; even a bit playful with him.
But cuddles?
This is a pretty huge new step in their relationship! :-D
As I was finishing up on my computer this morning, before heading into town for the afternoon, my husband came over to talk.
Our conversation was interrupted by a sudden, bizarre noise. I thought, for a moment, it was actually coming from outside.
Nope.
It was coming from my computer.
Once we established that, we could figure out that it was coming from a fan.
So I shut it down, and my wonderful, darling husband opened it up for me while I was away.
It was a mighty battle, but he was able to defeat the dust bunnies that had taken up residence in there.
Both fans were cakes on pretty solidly!
By the time I got home, my desktop was once again running on silent mode. :-D
Ah, but the technical stuff didn’t end there!
My husband gifted me with his new phone. My own phone plan is done next month, and he realized that his new tablet meets his needs quite well. So we’re transferring his new phone to me, then when my contract is done, we’re going to just switch things with the provider, and drop a phone off our bundle. This will knock a substantial chunk off our mobile phone bill (which is crazy high, considering we barely get any signal where we live).
So several hours were then spent getting those switched and set up.
I’ve been using Samsung phones for many years. The new phone is an LG. The user interface is going to take some getting used to! :-D
As I did my evening rounds, however, I had opportunity to test out the camera. It’s a dual lens camera, and supposed to be one of the better cell phone cameras out there.
Looks like Guildenstern has moved Junk Pile cat out of the yard.
Or maybe they’re just visiting another junk pile.
Well… not really a junk pile. The kitten is hiding under a hood that is over a pallet that it’s attached to. It has a handle attached to it. I think it was built to be a sort of sled, to be dragged behind a snowmobile.
Guildenstern was watching me suspiciously!
I do wish they would just stay with the other cats and kittens. The kittens would play with each other, but Butterscotch and Beep Beep have both been going after and chasing away Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, lately.
Rosencrantz seems to have taken her baby some place well outside the inner yard. No sign of that one, since the one day we saw it by the junk pile.
Ah, well. Such is life with semi-feral cats!
As for the camera… well, so far, the digital zoom does seem to be better than my old camera phone.
I headed outside to start rounding the kittens up and close them in the sun room for the night.
The kittens were all over the place, including in and out of the sun room.
Something, however, seemed odd.
It was getting dark, but the shadows seemed… darker, somehow.
Plus, something had the kittens’ attention.
Then they moved.
Not one, but 2!! skunks were in the sun room, eating cat kibble.
These two are smaller than the one that would visit us last year, and they have less white on them.
When I was first trying to figure out what I was seeing in the dark (I was able to lighten the photo up, so the skunks are more visible in the photo than they were in real life), there were a couple of kittens sharing the kibble with them.
All of the cats that were around showed only a mild curiousity about our visitors, and had no problem being near them. Likewise, the skunks had no real issue with the cats. They mostly ignored the cats, and only seemed to have a problem when there were too many kitties in the doorway.
We waited a while before putting the kittens away for the night! :-D
Both of the skunks went into the old kitchen. I kept watch from the side windows and saw one as it left, but where was the other? I saw it come to the window near me, go under the couch on the other side of the sun room, wander back into the old kitchen and out again, disappearing several times in the process.
After a while, I went to the old kitchen from the inside, making sure to rattle the door knob a bit and turning the light on, before opening the door. I saw no critters, so I went in and turned the light on in the sun room and started looking under things from the doorway before coming in.
Then I heard some noises on the other side of the freezer I was standing next too.
Sure enough, the skunk had gone behind the freezer, and I could just see its tail as it came out the other end and made it’s away through things to the other side of the room.
By the time we did get everything shut down for the night, I was still only about 95% sure the skunk was no longer in the old kitchen! (yes, it turned out to be gone)
They are such adorable critters. They are likely what is digging the holes I’m finding all over the yard lately. Dozens of tiny holes in groups around the yard, so I’m thinking there’s a fair few more than just these two! With the state of the lawn, I’m not too concerned about any damage they are doing, which is minimal to begin with. I rather like that they are eating grubs, which are probably worse for the lawn than their leaving little turf balls all over the place. :-)
The family that had come to look at the kittens a few days ago called back today. They had made a decision and asked if they could come by to pick up their new fur baby.
Zesty Nacho Blast had to be awakened from a nap by his new humans!
He is now at his new home, with his new human family, where he will have new animal companions and even a new name.
While picking a few more raspberries, I noticed some significant differences in the nearby chokecherry tree, compared to last year. Specifically, the ripening berries are already larger than the fully ripe berries I’d picked from this tree last year.
This location is closer to the house, where it gets shaded for much of the day by nearby spruce trees and the maple grove. Last year, I pruned this tree back and, thanks to my watering the transplanted raspberries, it got watered along with them.
I decided to check out the other two chokecherry trees among the lilacs that run along the north fence, where they (the lilacs) do a bang-up job keeping out the dust from cars passing by on the gravel road.
There are not a lot of berries on this one that I could see, and they are mostly very green; I made a point of getting a picture of the reddest ones I could find. These berries are quite a bit smaller than the tree closer to the house, though I’d say they are the same size as last year.
This tree is mostly hidden by lilac bushes, with a few branches leaning over where I mow. No watering happens this far from the house, other than what nature provides, and there has been no clean up or pruning of any kind. This tree is also in the section bordered to the south by a row of trees that was self-sown when my mother had raspberry bushes there. She transplanted the raspberries, but left the trees, splitting up a section of the old garden. The last time it was plowed, there was some attempt to plow along the north side of the trees, too, but with the trees there, that area is unusable for gardening.
She is not understanding why I see them and their location as a problem.
While this tree does get a lot of sun, that row of self-sown trees is large enough that, at certain times of day, they do shade it a bit. This is also near the end of the row of lilacs. After that, there are mature elms along the fence line that shade the area in the evening.
There is another chokecherry tree among the lilacs, and when I got to it, I found quite a surprise.
This tree has massive amounts of almost ripe berries!
Like the other tree among the lilacs, the only watering it’s been getting has been whatever rain we’ve had, and there has been zero pruning or clean up. The main difference is that there are no tall trees to shade it; just the lilacs it is growing with. Which means it gets full sun almost from sunrise to sunset. This time of year, I’d say about 9 or 10 hours of full sun a day, plus maybe 1 1/2 – 2 hours of non-direct light.
I would say the berries are about the same size as last year, though they are slightly bigger than the other one among the lilacs.
Earlier today, I was able to acquire a starter kit of equipment to start brewing mead. In looking up recipes, I’m excited to try some combinations. We’re already going to be using honey locally produced by my cousin. Some of the recipes include fruit and berries. I look forward to trying it out using our own sour cherries and chokecherries. Over time, we could also try it with raspberries (we won’t have enough this year) or Saskatoon berries (I think we’ll have to start over with new trees, though), haskap and other types of fruits and berries we will be growing as time goes by.
I think our first batch will be plain honey mead, as we learn the ropes, but I will be freezing cherries and chokecherries as we gather them (freezing helps with the release of natural sugars) to use in later batches.
I’m pretty excited about trying this out!!
Meanwhile…
Seeing how the same type of tree is doing in three different locations is giving me good information for when we are ready to plant other types of fruit, berry and nut trees around the property.
It may be hard to tell a downy from a hairy woodpecker, but there is no mistaking these guys!
It’s a fairly rare treat for a pileated woodpecker to come visit. Not only do they have a very distinctive red head, but they are much larger than our usual visitors. At one point, I could see him tearing pieces of this tree’s bark off and tossing it down to the ground! I don’t think I’ve ever seen a woodpecker do that before!
