Two days with the temps in the mid-eighties reminded me of July and August; opened the screen doors and aired the place out a bit. How do people manage to live in the south - - for lots of reasons, temperature and humidity included. Today the house heat is back on. Michigan! Click on photos to enlarge them.
Trees are greening up.
Mini-Daffodils arrive later but
seem happier than the earlier daffs.
Vinca and Wild Strawberries - Nice combo
All of the Winter-Garage-Sheltered Geraniums Survived!
Rose Breasted Grosbeaks Passing Through
Cherry Tree Has Its First Flowers
Female Baltimore Orioles.
(sorry, using up the last of the red dyed hummer food)
My bosc pear tree had around a dozen and a half pears the first year it produced fruit. (I didn't know I should have thinned the fruit out.) Last year there were only six. All of them both years were excellent and kept for a long time. This year I will definitely thin them out a bit so I don't have a down year next year - hopefully. I also didn't know that boscs need another variety to pollinate their flowers so this person who thought that he would never become an old man growing fruit trees, had to plant a bartlett pear tree in order actually to have pears! Note the cherry tree flowers above; did I decide on sweet or sour cherries? Hmmm. (The bartletts were good too!) I don't spray but I do spend some time picking off bugs (and watching birds pick them off too).
Grumpy Parrot or Owl?
Sunset
I suspect I don't see sunsets that are as spectacular as my sunrises because the colors are hidden by my northern evergreen forest. That does not mean I don't love the more subtle colors of early sunsets, I do.
The blue jay migrations are still in full swing. I'll be relieved when they all leave. Most of the "sunbirds" have returned here from winter vacations further south and are building nests. Eggs soon I suspect. All of the bluebird/tree swallow houses have occupants; there's even a house wren pair in one! The aerial acrobatics of the swallows are amazing.
We used to go the Point Pelee every spring with inveterate birders to see the amazing return of migrating birds. Now they come to me here now so I must be on the flyway. It's much easier; the birds come ridiculously close here but I miss the comraderie of good friends with shared interests.
( https://www.pc.gc.ca/en/pn-np/on/pelee/index )
