Steve`s Country
For a smile as wide as a country sunrise
Coffee Time #101. Watch That Ice!
Good morning everyone! Coffee is ready, just help yourself and relax for a few minutes with Muffin and I. It’s cloudy and cool, but, it’s not snowing today and it’s supposed to get sunny this afternoon. So maybe most of this snow will melt by this evening. That would be nice. It will also be nice to get rid of this ice on the deck. Wow, it is slippery out there! Twice now my feet decided to go places they were not supposed to go, but I didn’t fall anyway. But it will be nice when it melts off the deck. I really don’t like sliding around that way. I don’t like ice anymore, not since that fall a month ago down at the river when I slipped on that patch of ice. That was scary. Now I don’t like ice. Speaking of ice, I wonder if my chipmunks will come back out today.
There was 4 squirrels here yesterday, Jasper, Freddie, Chase and new guy. I need another name for him. Getting 4 males here together is quite something. And it was working for a while. Then Freddie and Chase got into a fight and Freddie chased him off the deck and down to Jasper who didn’t like being disturbed so he chased Chase back home and then came back and went after Freddie. The two just kind of stared at each other, and chattered. Then the angry squirrel dance began. Then Freddie attacked Jasper! They rolled around the deck for a bit, then Jasper jumped straight up and landed on Freddie! That was it and Freddie took off running back home. Then new guy showed up.
By now Jasper was in no mood to allow any new squirrels around so off he went chasing this new guy through the trees, up and down, across branches, jumping to other branches. Jasper is better at jumping than the other squirrels, he has had a lot of practice with the chipmunks. With one jump he caught new guy, they had quite the fight and new guy took off back home. Not bad. Jasper sent them all running. Bert has been back the last couple of nights. Fortunately I have remembered to bring my feeders inside at night. My landlord forgot to bring in her feeders so Bert got at them, broke one, just took the seeds out of the other one. Last Saturday Bert was around during the day so I was able to go out and get some nice pics of him which I am showing today. There’s a robin singing nicely this morning. Spring has returned. I hope you have a wonderful day and God bless!
Steve and Muffin.
©2021 Steve McLeod.
Steve’s Bird Of The Day #54.
Hi everyone and here we are with today’s bird, the “American white pelican”. These are huge birds with a 10 foot (about 3 meter) wingspan and are much larger than a bald eagle. They are actually among the heaviest flying birds in the world. They mainly nest on shallow lakes and marshes in the center of the continent, both in the US and Canada. But their range is steadily increasing east in the Great Lakes. Our lake was the only lake in Ontario where they would breed at one time, but along with the Great Lakes, at least 2 other lakes in NW Ontario now have breeding populations. Some people don’t like them because it has been long thought that white pelicans eat sport fish, but this is totally wrong. Most of their diet is fish of no importance for sport fishing such as carp and suckers. Breeding adults grow a unique “horn” or “sail” on their upper bill. Pelicans don’t carry food in their pouch, it is always swallowed before flying. They are majestic fliers and can soar high for long periods of time. These pelicans don’t dive, but rather dabble in shallow water for food. They will often get together to drive schools of fish into shallow water where they can easily scoop them up. They winter mainly along coastal areas.
Thanks for reading, have a great day and God bless!
Steve and Muffin.
©2021 Steve McLeod.
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