Cacophony of Crows

Yesterday I left the house at 6 something to go load up the yard waste from a cedar I had had limbed up the day before. It was sweaty, dusty work that filled my tank top with cedar bits, sap and sweat. I was a dirty mess when I got home. I got to the house and was being greeted by a cacophony of crow caws. Out of the piles of cedar bows came a fledgling crow. Which I stupidly thought I should take home, as it couldn’t fly. I called around and found out it would be best if I put it back from where it came, as long as the parents were still around. I drove off to Seward Park again, an 11 mile trip through town, to return the damned fledgling. I crossed the U. bridge and the pickup started to make a horrible rattly knocky sound. I turned around, parked in front of my house, went in and went back to bed. This morning was not going well.

Post nap, Sylvia came got me to deliver the crow. The parents were there, one of whom was biting the TV antenna. They didn’t seem too happy to see me, and the baby looked a little dazed. “Mom, Dad, I don’t even know where to begin. There was a bunny, a dog, a house…I had the strangest morning.”

Since we were there, we went on a walk in a big field at the park. The dogs were in heaven in the tall grass. I thought Thomas was lying down in the grass, but alas, he was just completely covered by it.

I found a stack of plastic cards, including a Tower of Records and REI gift card. Things were looking up. We stepped over the body and retrieved the cards and headed to Tower and bought a CD of Charlie Patton, a blues guitar fellow from the dawn of time.

So….go ahead and guess what all the fuss was about when Sylvia and I were playing cribbage on the front porch??? Thomas lept off the front porch and 3 crows plus a few more were making a horrible racket. That’s right. Another fledgling. I took it out of its hiding place it had found hopping away from Thomas, and set it out on the lawn for the parents to coach. No wonder they are so obnoxious. They start out, jumping from a nest and have their parents yell at them ‘til they learn to fly.

Unusual Occurrences

First of all, the whole hammock thing. Changing my morning contemplation routine and all. Then it was hot the last two days. 87! Luckily it wasn't humid. And then, without the aid of a full moon, in walks Old Naked Man into Irwins Coffee Shop. I'd walked up from a clients house to meet a friend for coffee. We were sitting there when she said, "Did you see that? " I said no, and she said, "That man was completely naked." He walked by and smiled and waved at us. No missing him, really.

Then we saw two school buses that had been converted into little hobbit houses, belly dancing, and I can't remember what other odd thing we saw. There was something.

A memorable day.

Change

This morning, even though I went to bed near midnight last night, I still got up at 4:45am. The radical change occured when I made coffee and went on the front porch. So, instead of sitting in the black chair at the end of the porch, I went down and sat in the hammock. Thomas jumped in with me. He didn't like the swinging characteristic of hammock lounging, so he jumped out. Anyway, I saw entirely different birds this morning. A great blue heron heading off to Lake WA on his way to work as a fisherman, and what looked like a Common Murr flying overhead. I went in and told Kim of the change, and she said, "Way to mix it up, S.A.!"

Sal's Pretty Good Word of Mouth Gardening

Well, I got a return address self inking stamp and an invoice book and I gerry-rigged PVC pipe to hold my tools vertically on the back of the pick up. And I drive a Ford. I need an animal head sticker, say a deer, on the side and an itty bitty gun rack to make the whole look complete. A friend thought I should get a sign on the side of the truck, but without the phone number since it is a word of mouth business. I think I'll start voting republican to keep those damned liberals out of the hair of we small business owners.

House Guests

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Originally uploaded by sasadler.

Today Ellie, Sylvia and I went to Whidby Island to awe at kite boarders flying through the air at Useless Bay and pick up 6 baby chicks. Just what the Ashworth Farm needed.

On the way home, we got to talking about critters and I told a story about a giant spider, a giant lizard, a cobra who greeted me on my first day of service, and a less giant lizard called a Tokay. The largest of the gecko family of lizards comin' in at about a foot. One of these blue/grey red spotted fellows, (aren't they all male?) lived on my roof, I think, and came into my bathroom to scare the socks off me. While he remained still and quiet, he occationally would hiss if I got too close. The quiet bit was only during the time we shared the bathroom. Several times through the night, he would call, "TO-Kay, TO-Kay, TO-Kay," up to 4 times, as 5 times was supposed to bring luck.

By the way, this was when I lived in Thailand. These critters don't hang around the bathrooms of Wallingford.

Bunny Sanitation

While he is litter box trained, he does leave little pellets around that don't last long, as Thomas likes 'em.

The Big Feller

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Originally uploaded by sasadler.

Cotton, Kaola, Fuzzy, Fluffy or Mr rabbit

After a failed attempt to find the Crazy Woman's 5 acre parsel with llamas, turkeys, burrows, roosters, rabbits, and I don't even want to think about how many cats, I found a nice gay fellow, Mike, whose boyfriend, Mike, and he live on capital hill. They only have 5 cats, 3 rabbits, 2 dogs. they have thier own apartment. the animals that is. Anyway, Mike #1 works at the animal shelter and was fostering this big guy, who was the size of a peanut when he got him. Ellie's birthday present. My sister said she hates rabbits. I started saying how I was allergic to cats, and telling her that the rabbit was litter box trained, and and and...then I remembered, Oh Yeah, this is Laurie trying to get me going. Why does this still work after 40 years?

I am watching Ellie teach Phoenix how to hold a baby carrot to give the rabbit. She is such a know it all. I wonder where she could have possibly developed that trait??

Mike, the oh so gay animal freak of Capital Hill, was happy to have met Ellie and me, as the rabbit took to us quickly, and he liked the fact that Ellie, Thomas, and most all the other critters around here were adopted. Mike # 2 said adoption was the way to go. When we got there, Ellie walked in and told Mike, "I won't be able to always take care of the bunny, cause I have school and stuff." She was very excited and talking a lot about all the animals she has and takes care of and how she played "Treat Girl" with our old dog Bertie. Mike # 1 brought up a little crate, the rabbits little crock and his little toy bunny. I said, "Could you be more gay?" He laughed, "No."

The bunny is home, and seems content, slowly exploring his new home.

Things Are Looking Up

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Originally uploaded by sasadler.

Or at least Jean and I were looking up. After a thoroughly crappy week, we went to the Nisqually Delta to go canoeing at the Nisqually Wildlife Refuge. I was in charge of checking tide charts and finding the place to put in. I need different responsibilities for future trips dependent on put-in places and understanding of tides. I should really just be in charge of driving, food and bird books.

It was POURING down rain all the way there. But we didn't get rained on at all. First of all, because we were in the car. And B., because we ended up in the Nisqually Rain Shadow. The only rain free zone in the south sound.

There were Purple Martins in nesting boxes where we launched. On the North side of the river there were blue herons, terns, swallows, (Cliff, Barn, and probably Violet Green) Occasionally we would see other birds we couldn't ID on the N. side. That is the marshy main part of the refuge. On the S. side is a mixed forest. We let ourselves drift to see if we could see any of the birds responsible for the cacophony of song. I was thrilled to see at least two pairs of Western Tanagers. Not v. common in these parts and it seems early for them to be up here. They Winter in Central and South America. Smart critters.

Both Jean-Jean and I like exploring little nooks, crannies and inlets. A fine idea if the tide was coming. I said, I am sure it is coming in. After a pause, I am not absolutely sure. I was SOOOOOOOOO wrong. Shortly after I reached into the muddy shallows to toss a little gray crab into the canoe, we noticed that we were pretty much in a mud puddle. Jean-Jean started saying things like, time is of the essence. I started cracking up wondering why, why, every time J2 and I are in a canoe something happens that results in someone leaving the boat and my laughing hysterically. Last time, I fell out of the boat in front of Rays Boat House lunch guests who looked down wondering, Why is that woman in the water?

Jean and I tried to step out into the mud. The mud had a different ider about that. We were slurped up. So Jean thought she would jump to what was hopefully more solid ground. She pulled me in the boat through the mud. I was paddling mud.

The shortlist for birds the day: Western Wood Peewee, Western Tanager, Baby Bald Eagle, Bullocks Oriole, Great Blue Heron, the American Crow

Lost and Found

What a day. I got up at around 5:30 this morning and was distracted. I pulled the dog gate on the front porch and went back in the house to do something. Who knows what. Thomas slipped through the gate. Now, he is not a wanderer, but he will go with anyone who will scratch his wee head. I called for him, waited, then an hour had passed and I went around the neighborhood and looked high and low. His tags are on his collar. But alas, the one with our phone number had worn a bit.

I spent the day worried, went to the animal shelter. Checked messages every half hour or so. I went back to work after picking up Ellison, came home at 6 or so. Talked to Animal Control again. He had been gone for 10 hours! Nothing. I sat at my desk and put my head down. Kim came and set her hand on my back and I cried.

Ellie, while trying to be helpful, by telling me she hoped that Thomas hadn't been hit by a car, didn't really make me feel better. She told me all the people she had told to look out for him. Jacque’s dad, the standard poodle Thomas likes to hump, Driscole and his cousin...

I asked a friend to take Ellie so I could spend the evening walking around the neighborhood looking for the pooch before I lost my temper with Ellie. I wanted to do something, though it felt hopeless at this late hour.

Then, at 6:30 or so, the Animal Control called. Someone this morning had brought him to the vet. They had tried our phone number, though I guess they read it wrong on the worn tag. A new one was purchased today. The 2 block and 45 dollar taxi ride with Seattle’s Finest, brought a very, very happy pooch home to a very, very happy mother.

Ellie asked, “Can you, me and Thomas all sleep in the same bed tonight?”

Mechanical

About 18 years ago, I did all of my own car repair. I did a tune up on the blue Mazda pickup, replaced the break master cylinder in the '72 Datsun. Now, none of the work was efficient or even effective, but, I figured I could figure out most things given the right tools, book and phone numbers.

Last night I gave OLO a tune up. Now, instead of running poorly, it doesn't run at all.

Snipets O' the Day

* I wish I had named the blog that.

* Decided to take Olo the ancient Volvo to the 1st and Last T-ball game of the season. Ellie quit today. When we returned to the car, she asked if the car had a car alarm, as we had left it unlocked with the windows down. I told her no and asked why. She said, "I don't want anyone to steal anything." I looked into the car and asked, "Like what???

* We were playing a word game during mother's day brunch, with the other mommy, Kim, Gavin, (Who is a miserable failure at such a concept as rhyming) So it goes like this, "Make me a rhyme, in double quick time, the word to rhyme is....e.g. 'Dog'"
So, we had gone around the table a couple times and Ellie said, "Make me a rhyme, in double quick time, and the word to rhyme is Phoenix"
Phoenix yelled with bright enthusiasm and his arm raised in victory, "Penis!!!"
We all lost it.

Hope with Feathers

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Originally uploaded by sasadler.

By JAMES GORMAN, Contributor to the NYT and Sal's blog.

(I am not the only one giddy about the news...)

Emily Dickinson was right: hope is the thing with feathers. What she didn't know was that it lives in an Arkansas swamp and has a big ivory bill.

On Thursday, the day that scientists announced the first confirmed sighting of an ivory-billed woodpecker in 60 years, I went for a short paddle in the Cache River National Wildlife Refuge, where the bird was seen. And I was trying to adjust to the good news.

Furthermore, as a journalist, I'm not used to good news. There's just not that much of it. So the report that the ivory bill lived took me off guard. I got a bit overexcited and flew down to Little Rock from New York, drove out to Bayou de View in the refuge and got in a canoe.

Audubon called it the "great chieftain of the woodpecker tribe" and others called it the Lord God bird because when people saw it, they said, "Lord God!" But it was gone, one of the natural treasures that a growing country stepped on and broke.

Tim Gallagher, who wrote "The Grail Bird" about the search and the sighting of the ivory bill, said that Bobby Harrison, his partner on the search, wept when he saw the bird fly in front of his canoe. I know of at least one person with no connection to the search who wept on reading the news, and I'm sure he was not alone.

Why was the discovery so powerful?

I think it is the reason for the bird's survival. It wasn't a miracle. It wasn't luck. And it wasn't simply the resilience of nature, although that helped. The reason for the astonishing re-emergence of a mysterious bird is as mundane as can be. It is habitat preservation, achieved by hard, tedious work, like lobbying, legislating and fund-raising.

There was luck involved, of course. But my favorite comment about luck was made by Branch Rickey, who said, "Luck is the residue of design." Chance favors the protected wetland.

It is possible that this is the last ivory bill, that it won't appear again. And we have to trust the judgment and expertise of the scientists involved on the sighting because there is no crystal-clear photograph. Instead, there are detailed observations and an analysis of a blurry bit of videotape.

In most cases, I might hesitate to allow myself to join in the celebration. But I'm going with the experts in this case.

I am giving in to hope. Perhaps there are more ivory bills. I really hope so. The thing with feathers has got me in its grip.

Another New Best Friend???

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Originally uploaded by sasadler.

Saturday, my ex and daughter joined a bunch of us who had worked in my back garden on that beautiful Saturday for Pizza at Stellar's. Great place, by the way. Anyway, I asked the ex if she had received the phone message from me about the Ivory billed Woodpecker. She said enthusiastically that she had. And she had told all of her colleagues and anyone who was willing to listen about the news. She also got some blank stares. The best she got was a polite co-worker who tried to ask intelligent questions.

At the Pizza joint, a kid friendly place without being kid oriented, e.g. Chucky Cheese-esque, we gave the kids money to choose songs on the CD Jukebox. Ellie had chosen a song that made my skin crawl and Ellie's head rock quickly back and forth like she was about to rush the stage or join a mosh-pit. My dear friend, whom I'll call Sandrine the French Girl, said to her husband, I thought this was a surfing song? He said, "You missed the part of the band name, Butt-hole". They are the Butt-Hole Surfers. To give the poor woman credit, she is from France.

The same woman nearly died when both her daughter's like Rootbeer. Apparently, it is despised in Europe.

Outside there was a large dog. I said, "Is that a wolf hybrid?â"This pierced, tattooed fellow said, "Of course not, they are illegal in Seattle." I said, when where did you get him? he said there is a breeder in Northern California. The dog was about the size of an Irish Wolfhound, with yellow eyes and very skinny.

I Love Spring

Now, I am a person with a penchant for hyperbole, as you may know. That is if you have ever spent more than 3 minutes with me. Well, to say that I love spring, doesn’t come close to accurately describing the feeling that I get when I sit here on the front porch at 7 in the morning listening to a White Crowned Sparrow and Song Sparrow compete for my attention.

I wish I could write or draw or sing the songs they sing to give you an idea of variety and joy. But I can’t. You’ll just have to go to the website and listen for yourself, or better yet, go outside and drink your coffee on your back deck, before you rush off to send the children to school. Listen, he’ll sing for you.

Lately, my enthusiasm for birds in particular has been pointed out as something perhaps unique. Not in my family, and frankly, I have been surprised at the lack-luster response to the Ivory Billed Woodpeckers return from the great abyss. However, to give my dear friends, neighbors and strangers credit, several have told me they saw the pictures on the TV of the IBW, and seemed to think it was newsworthy.

J and E even were (acted?) excited when I downloaded the video for them and patiently waited while the dial-up showed them the crappy feed of the poor quality footage of the new discovery. Bless them.

But last night, I was humbled by my friend whom I’ll call Mike. The man, with an MBA loves the critters o’ creation. He named every swan on the planet, knew nearly as much about the Ivory Billed Woodpecker as those of us obsessed with such things, and had a strange fascination with water buffalo.
He saw a baby beaver at Meadowbrook with it’s mama teaching it to swim. It apparently made him happy for a week. This is a man to admire.

Aphids have a new charm for me. Given that previously they had none, I suppose a “new charm” would be a misnomer. There is a plum tree right in front of my porch that gives me and my neighbors, both human and avian, great joy. People seem drawn to the flowers that are now little olive looking plums. Birds, specifically the Bushtit, like to eat the blossoms of the flowers, and now like to eat the aphids who are sucking the life out of the leaves. The Chickadees like to use it as a staging ground to access the feeder. At least one Chickadee seems particularly found of the peanuts in the mix. Funny.

Last night, with my friend whom I am still calling Sylvia, and I were musing on the names of flora and fauna with names that are, well, embarrassing.

I am starting a list:
Bushtit, Titmouse, Bluetit, Coaltit, Nipplewort. Beaver. I am waiting for the Beaver Rumped Titwort to come on the scene.

Cheap Thrills

Saturday I was at Steve’s News, which really isn’t called that, there was an Old Timer behind me in line. I asked if he were just getting the paper. He said yes. So I told the cashier, “And his paper.” The old timer didn’t hear that. So as I was walking out, I heard the cashier say, “She got it.” I then heard the Old Timer say, in a really cute, high kid-like voice, “Really???” Made my day for 50 cents.