Around the yard

Hello, it is amazing how fast the weeks are flying by. My photos are still from the month of May. There is so much activity with the birds in my yard, babies are already growing quickly.

My thoughts and prayers are with all the Orlando victims and their families. Also for Christina Grimmie (from The Voice) also shot in Orlando. Also, very sad at the Disney resort a Gator attacking and killing a 2 year old. 


For Teresa's Friday's Hunt: the letter "y", week's favorite  and "in my shoes".

I am sharing some birds, flowers and sky shots from around my yard.

 A closeup of one of the Carolina Wrens. Carolina Wrens are known to be very loud birds. They can have up to 20-32  patterns of songs and can sing year round.

A family of Carolina Wren pecking at the droppings from my suet feeder above.

For Today's Flowers . Thank you to Denise the host of Today's Flowers

We have a lot of pretty Clematis blooms on our fence. There are around 300 species of Clematis. We have at least three different species growing in our yard.

A House Wren has been busy all over my yard, singing up a storm. The courtship of male house wren consist of singing and showing the female houses for potential nests. They often puncture eggs of other birds to prevent other birds nesting nearby. If it is possible for a bird to be mean, the House Wren  are meanies.

This is one of neighborhood Great Blue Herons standing close to it's nest.

I can stand "in my shoes" on the fire road not far from my house and look over at the Heron's nest. Sometimes I can see the heron on the tree tops from my kitchen window. On this day I think the heron decided to pose nicely for me.  LOL not really just for me, I was kind of far away from the nest.

The moon on May 26th, the waning gibbous and 81% visible. My addiction to the moon continues, as long as the sky is clear.


 As always, thank you for visiting and for the nice comments. I wish everyone a happy day and weekend ahead.

Here is a list of linky parties for part of the week, I hope to see you there.

Thanks to Theresa @ The Run*A*Round Ranch for hosting Good Fences.
Thank you to Sylvia, Yogi and Sandy for hosting Skywatch Friday.
Thank you to Denise the host of Today's Flowers
Thanks also to Teresa Friday's Hunt
Thanks to Tom for hosting The Barn Collective

Making lemonade

I have a list below of memes I am joining for this week, and to save time I am doing one post for all. They are all fun memes to participate in...I hope you can join in with the fun  and check out some of the participating posts. Special thanks to all the wonderful host and their memes, I hope you have some time to check them out.

I am behind in sharing my photos and jumping all around these are from April 30th. At this time the weather was usually either cloudy, rainy and chilly. The reason for my title, the weather was not going to clear up days so we took our chances and made lemonade out of one of the cloudy days. We were able to do some walking, birding and make it home before the rain started.


Teresa's Friday's Hunt:  The letter V,  Week's Favorite, Sunshine.

Start's with V..photo below. I like the Virginia Bluebells in bloom along the river trail.

 Weeks Favorite  is below, I like the mill and the big knotty tree. These trees in the spring are full of warblers and Baltimore Orioles. The birds, it is one of the reasons for being at the park on this day.

Random 5 Friday

1. Rock Run Historic Area with the Grist Mill at the Susquehanna River State Park in Maryland. I was looking for some fence scenes, the fence around the mill is perfect for Tex's Good Fence meme. The Grist Mill was erected in 1798 and in 1958 three hundred acres of this land was donated to the State of Maryland to create a park.

2. "Go all out, don't be embarrassed or scared." I love this shot below with the Great Blue Heron sticking it's head into the water for a fish.

3. We enjoy a spring walk at the Susquehanna River State Park, the wildflowers are so pretty in the spring. Advice from a wildflower: Show your true colors, delight in simple pleasures, celebrate your natural beauty, open up, spread seeds of joy, it's OK to be a late bloomer and be wild and wonderful. Thanks to Denise the host of Today's Flowers!

4. I do try to learn the bird id's. I guessed right on this bird and received confirmation that it is the Northern Rough-winged Swallow. This bird was flying around and under the fishing bridge at the Susquehanna River.

5. When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.  In our case it was get out for a walk on a cloudy chilly day. The weather was only going to get worse. My Friday Skywatch, a cloudy day at the Susquehanna River.

Did you have fun on my walk?  I hope you enjoyed my post and images. As always, thank you for visiting and for the nice comments. Have a happy weekend ahead!

To see more pretty skies, fences and fantastic photos from around the world please visit the memes below.  Thanks for visiting and for all the nice comments. I wish everyone a happy day and weekend ahead.

Here is a list of linky parties for part of the week, I hope to see you there.

Thanks to Theresa @ The Run*A*Round Ranch for hosting Good Fences.

Thank you to Sylvia, Yogi  and Sandy for hosting Skywatch Friday.
Thank you to Denise the host of Today's Flowers

Thank you to Nancy the host of Random 5 Friday

Thanks also to Teresa Friday's Hunt 
Thanks to Tom for hosting The Barn Collective

Birds, butterflies and blooms

I am linking up with Fiona's Green Day and Misty Dawn's Camera Critters and Today's Flowers

These are some shots from around my yard and a pretty female Orchard Oriole. I was a happy birder to see the Orchard Oriole show up in my yard one day.

The female looks like a larger size Goldfinch, 2 inches larger and  the beak is a little different. It has the white wing bars and is a summer bird for my area.

Another day I saw this same bird or another one just like chasing a crow across my yard. I have a feeling they could have been nesting nearby or it was protecting it babies.

My butterfly bushes are great for attracting the butterflies. This Tiger Swallowtail is a common butterfly seen in my yard.

I am pretty sure this is a Great Spangled Fritillary butterfly.

My Goldie girl  at the lake, she has had another haircut and is looking more like a yellow lab than a golden retriever.

My Black-eyed Susans are looking especially pretty this year. It is the state flower of Maryland. I am hoping to link up with Today's Flowers. Which has been on a break and will be starting back up this weekend on the 18th. I hope, I missed the gorgeous flowers.

These are a couple of my trumpet vine flowers, they grow on what hubby and I call the monster on our deck. It seems the  hummingbirds love the flowers. They are a great natural nectar for the hummers. I have watched the hummer almost get lost inside one of these large tube flowers.

To see more cute critters please visit Camera Critters and Green Day and Today's Flowers

Special thanks to the wonderful host Fiona of Green Day, Misty of Camera Critters and the M. Luiz of Today's Flowers.

I hope you enjoyed my critter post and flowers. Thanks for stopping by, i hope everyone has a safe and happy weekend.

Birds & Blooms

I am linking up with Today's Flowers  and  Our World Tuesday


I have been so happy with the Clematis this season. There have been so many blooms. I have three species and each one is gorgeous. These are some shots of my pretty Clematis blooms and of course I have to throw in some of my pretty yard birds. 

Other favorites in my yard are the irises and the Stella D'oro daylilies. The rhododendrons looked gorgeous filled with purple blooms. I guess you can tell purple is my favorite color for flowers.

Above, I watched a juvenile Tufted Titmouse. It was sitting on a branch waiting for the parent to come back with food. Also included above are the irises and clematis that I love.

I hope you enjoy my birds and blooms, they are definitely some of my favorites.
To see more beautiful flowers and photos please visit Today's Flowers  and Our World Tuesday.
Thanks to the host of Today's Flowers and to the hosting groups of Our World Tuesday. Also, thanks for the visit to my blog. I hope everyone has a great week ahead.

Birding the Irvine Nature Center

With my nature center post I am linking up with Scenic Sunday and Today's Flowers
and Mosaic Monday

During the month of October, I was able to visit the Irvine Nature Center twice. Once with my bird club and last weekend I went with my hubby. Of course the nature center trails were great for birding. But it was also nice to see some of the trees looking beautiful with their fall foilage.

 I was amazed at the amount of wildflowers we saw growing on the field. It was the third weekend in October and these flowers were looking gorgeous and still attracting the Fritallary and Buckeye butterflies and Sulfurs. 

Can you find the Fritillary above, the butterfly almost blends in witht he flowers and background.

The fields are great for attracting sparrows and this is a great time of year to see new and to compare different sparrows. They are one of the hardest birds for me to id, so many of them resemble other sparrows. My lifer seen at the nature center with the bird club was the Lincoln Sparrow. I tried hard to get photos of these sparrows but they seemed very camera shy.

Talking about camera shy, can you find the sparrow hidden in the bush above?  Sparrows seen both days were the Lincoln, White Throated, White Crowned, Swamp, Chipping, Field and Song Sparrows.  I was hoping for a sighting of a Vespar or Grasshopper Sparrow. But, I was still happy with my Lincoln Sparrow lifer.

Above the mosaic, shows a sparrow, trails coming out of the woods onto the field, some fall foilage, the field of wildflowers and tons of sparrows. I was amazed at the amount of sparrow we saw here. Other birds seen were the Eastern Phoebe, woodpeckers, Hawks, Kestrel, Palm Warblers, Towhees, Canada Geese and we flushed a Snipe twice.

 It is hard to believe that this field today is most likely covered in snow. I was so happy that I was able to visit this Nature Center while these beautiful flowers were still blooming.

I hope you enjoyed my visit to the Irvine Nature Center and I hope you are able to
visit with Today's Flowers and Scenic Sunday and Mosaic Monday.  Thanks to all the wonderful hosts and thank you for stopping by to see my post.  I hope everyone has a Happy Sunday and a wonderful week ahead.

Around the yard

I am linking up with Todays Flowers and Mosaic Monday and Ruby Tuesday

Even though it is officially fall my flowers are still blooming and looking beautiful. Yesterday I walked around my yard taking some photos of the flowers, birds and the frogs at the pond. We have hads tons of rain here and I guess that helps, even though I am sick of the rain. The flowers are happy, the frogs seem really happy and the birds looked wet. I am still being rewarded with some sweet cherry tomatoes.  I really wanted and needed was some sunshine.

It's been damp, my poor bear has turkey feathers growing. Have you ever seen a bear with feathers? LOL

The winterberries are looking so colorful and my butterfly bushes are still  attracted a pretty Fritillary.

The zinnias and lantana are blooming and my dogwood tree has these colorful red berries.

The American Goldfinch is one of my year round sweeties.

This Catbird should be leaving soon and be replaced with some winter birds.

In my mosaic above I have some of my the Catbirds, my sweet Goldfinches, a few of my pond frogs, a cute chipper and a fussy Titmouse.

  The winterberry bush is looking colorful.

I have been really happy with these zinnias, they bloomed all summer long and are still blooming.

'

Fritillary on my butterfly bush

My pond frog, it has the biggest eyes.

I hope you enjoyed my walk around my yard. To see many more beautiful flowers, mosaics and photos please visit: Today's Flowers and Mosaic Monday and Ruby Tuesday

Thanks to the host of Todays Flowers: Santili,  Denise, Sandy, Pupo and to Mary of Mosaic Monday

and to Marytheteach at Ruby Tuesday.

Also, thanks for stopping by and visiting my blog and post. I hope evveryone has a great week. Hopefully a sunny week.