A lawn mowing/bluebird observation with pics!

[Henrietta23]

I've lived in this house for nearly 22 years now. Until last summer the man who lived across the street, George, mowed his lawn practically every other day, keeping it extremely short. Last August he unfortunately passed away. Now George's grandson mows the lawn once a week for his grandmother. The grass, while still neat, is a bit longer than it ever has been. The observation? The past few mornings since I've been out on summer break I've had a little more time to sit on my sofa. The other morning something caught my eye out the front picture window that looks into the side yard across the street with its slightly longer grass. A flash of blue dropped from the telephone wire onto the grass then back up to the wire. Could it be? Something I've seen but never in my own woodsy neighborhood! A BLUEBIRD???? Yup, they're here every morning then again in the evening. There must be just the right bugs in that slightly longer grass. There's at least one pair of them, possibly more. Very exciting! It was a big deal when we started seeing bluebirds in this area and now they're right here in front of me!

 

[Wannabefree]

Cool! I love bluebirds We have a LOT of them this year, common as sparrows right now.

 

[Henrietta23]

Cool! I love bluebirds We have a LOT of them this year, common as sparrows right now.

 

[BarredBuff]

We have tons of cardinals around here despite being Wildcat fans (a little corny KY humor)

 

[Henrietta23]

We have tons of cardinals around here despite being Wildcat fans (a little corny KY humor)

My parents do too. They have wetlands behind their house and will have as many as two dozen male cardinals visible from their back windows at any time. It's amazing!

 

[lwheelr]

We have Cardinals flying around here. They look kind of funny - the red is not brilliant, more of a dusty red. Sort of like a black bird got dipped in red Kool-aid.

Still kinda cool though, I'd never seen a live one before we moved here.

Some other kind of black and white bird (similar to a Magpie, but different pattern) was teasing a squirrel the other day. The bird was on the fence, the squirrel was at the base of a tree beside the fence, running up and down the trunk. The bird kept bopping down from the fence to quickly peck at the squirrel, which would run around the base of the trunk to try to avoid it. It didn't run away though, must have wanted something there. Kinda funny to watch.

 

[Henrietta23]

My parents have a strain of washed out cardinals, more pink than red. And then there was the year of the bald cardinal. There was this one male with no feathers on his head. Their skin is black! It was weird. The next year there were more like him. It was like a lesson in genetics there!
They have a lot of Rose breasted Grosbeaks too. Right now they're enjoying babies. Both parents feed seeds to the babies on the deck rail even though the babies are now as big as the parents.
Mom likes to show off her bird pics. At least I finally have birds she doesn't. She's never seen a blue bird at her house. (Now I have to borrow her zoom lens to get pictures of them!)

 

[savingdogs]

We have beautiful blue scrub jays here year-round. They are so fun to watch! They are easy to spot in the winter against the white with their bright blue shade. In summer they tend to blend in with all the other birds a bit more, but we enjoy them year-round. They might actually be a different kind of jay.

We have not been mowing our lawn, the push mower is too difficult to get the whole thing done and my real mower is broken. I'd love to take more lawn out, I think cutting it all the time is just silly unless you have a real reason to have lawn.

 

[Marianne]

I agree. I'm a 'grow food instead of grass' kind of gal.
We finally had NO choice but to buy a new mower. DH mowed out front so it's really nice and tidy...and too short. Now that we're in triple digit heat, it's really crispy, too. Cost $20 to fill up the gas can. Mowed down the lilies, but left the patch of ragweed. I think he has a comprehension problem. The next time he wants to mow, we're going to have a chat about it.

We had bluebirds here, but I think we cut down their homes when we took down some storm damaged trees. I've hardly seen any this year.

 

[Henrietta23]

Marianne, do you get Eastern Bluebirds or Mountain bluebirds where you are? We get the Eastern ones here. For a long time they were gone, just not anywhere to been seen. I grew up hearing about them but never saw one until there was a big effort to get them back. Bluebird houses, etc. Eastern bluebirds prefer open spaces so lawns (or golf courses, or other open grassy spaces) are unfortunately necessary! We are very wooded here so I never thought we'd see them so close to our house