20-Dec-2019
Northern cardinal, female
Barry found this pretty female cardinal perched in a patch of sunlight. There seem to be more cardinals around the garden again this winter.
20-Dec-2019
White-breasted nuthatch
These are really active and vocal little birds, particularly in winter as they seek food both at the feeders and on vegetation.
20-Dec-2019
Black walnut (Juglans nigra)
This is the food item all the squirrels have been finding and running away with! Reds cache them in piles but the grey squirrels ferret them out and feed on them as well.
20-Dec-2019
Red squirrel (Tamiasciurus hudsonicus)
An inquisitive looking red squirrel, no doubt really more concerned about guarding its food cache.
20-Dec-2019
Cottontail rabbit
This photo by Barry shows just how adept rabbits are at hiding. They tend to freeze as often as not, relying on absolute stillness to protect them. When still and sitting behind a shrubby cover they can be overlooked.
23-Dec-2019
Grey squirrel (Sciurus carolinensis)
This is the black or melanistic phase of the grey squirrel, more common around here than the grey colour. It is eating a walnut, which it, along with about 6 or 7 other greys, dug up from a cache under a walnut tree. The cache being the hard work of a red squirrel. There was a red nearby chattering madly as the greys ran back and forth with the walnuts.
23-Dec-2019
Red squirrel (Tamiasciurus hudsonicus)
And here is the red squirrel that wasn't too happy about the grey squirrels raiding its cache of walnuts.
23-Dec-2019
Mossy rose gall
This large, distinctive gall found on rose bushes is caused by a wasp in the Cynipidae family.
23-Dec-2019
Hairy woodpecker. male
There were not a lot of birds noted during the time I spent at the garden just before Christmas, but the best place to see any that were there, was the feeder in the Backyard Garden. Here a hairy woodpecker is enjoying the peanuts.
23-Dec-2019
Mourning dove
This lone mourning dove appeared just before I left the garden.
23-Dec-2019
House finches, pair
It is always good to see these birds at the garden. Difficult to remember the days, now a few decades in the past, when some winters we'd see large flocks of these birds at the garden, along with big flocks of 80 or more house sparrows. The latter have not been seen, as far as I can tell, at the garden since 2009.
23-Dec-2019
Food cache
A stash of sumac cones and a few walnuts, gathered by red squirrels for eating later.