Good morning and Happy October everyone!! The time is going by so fast, we are into the end of fall now, soon the trees will be bare waiting for the next season to arrive. And Thanksgiving Day is fast approaching, which for us in Canada is the second Monday of October, which is the 11th this year. Although I always maintain that we should be thankful every day, not just once a year. Still, it is nice to have that day each year. Sometimes we need reminders. It is a beautiful sunny morning, the sky is a rich blue again, the leaves are glowing in their various colors. The blue jays are busy filling themselves with peanuts, with a few “discussions” among the dominant males.

The chipmunks were quite late getting here this morning but there are now 4 of them eagerly filling their cheeks with sunflower seeds and peanuts. So interesting to see the chipmunks and blue jays together. The chipmunks don’t back down, even when chased by the blue jays, but they do stay on guard around them. But with some blue jays they are very relaxed and will sit there quite peacefully next to the blue jay as they both fill up with the sunflower seeds. In between the white-throated sparrows, there are lots of them now, will try to get in there and grab a sunflower seed or even a partially broken open peanut.

Everyone loves peanuts around here. The crows just showed up cawing excitedly about something. But as usual I couldn’t see anything, but likely it was a roaming cat from the next street. He comes around quite a bit and I’m wondering if that’s why I lost some chipmunks so early this fall. Autumn is a beautiful time of the year, but the colorful part is so very short, maybe a week at the most for us. The leaves are already falling in large numbers, many trees are already bare, the last of the trees, which are the aspens for us, are now changing color quickly and dropping their leaves as fast as they change color it seems.

Looks like I will miss getting any really good pictures this year again, that will be 2 years in a row. So sad. That’s what happens when we don’t get a frost to get those leaves changing color all at the same time. That’s when we really get a spectacular show. But it’s still beautiful out there and I’m enjoying it, even without many pictures. Time to put out more food for the birds and chipmunks, and get more coffee too. I hope you all have a most wonderful day and God bless!

Steve and Muffin.

©2021 Steve McLeod.