It would almost be sweet if it wasn't so annoying for you, Linda. Do you feed the birds on your property? I'm wondering if he bullies other kinds of birds. How funny that he has to return to your house.

I don't have a woodpecker, but I do have a fishpond on my property. Fish go dormant in the winter, staying down at the bottom of the pond in hibernation while the top several inches freeze over. This past week they "woke up" so to speak, and I resumed feeding them. (You don't feed them while dormant.) And much to my surprise, there were no longer nine fish in there...there were fourteen! Five tiny babies came to the top of the water to eat. Guess those original nine fish weren't all that dormant after all. LOL

I'm glad it's spring!

Each of the backyards in my neighborhood has an old tree that's at least 100+ feet tall so there's a lot of dead wood up there for bugs to feast on. He's perfectly happy to let the other woodpeckers in the neighborhood have their own trees. He has my house (and my tree) all to himself.

If those trees decide to play a gigantic game of dominoes, my house and my neighbors' will not be on the winning side, if you get my drift.

YIKES! I hadn't thought of that. What can be done? Should people cut down the trees or can someone come and do something to deter the woodpeckers??

My father-in-law had a woodpecker knocking on the side of the house for years. But he didn't do any damage.

rowe

Linda,

Your woodpecker story made me laugh. It sounds like our Redheaded woodpeckers here. They are raucous tweeties with their loud "Whir, whir" call and their love of finding aluminum or anything metallic to drill on and loudly declare territory. For us it's the metal fireplace top cap. That echoes like crazy like a giant, tinny gong! "Oh boy! Listen to that, will ya," says tweetie!

Whenever possible, it's best to leave dead trees up. They provide sources of food and nesting for many critters. It's all part of the natural balance of nature. If your home is threatened though by an unexpected "T I M B E R!" by all means take the dangerous thing down!
PeachyBC

I'm lucky, none of my woodpeckers play the 1812 Overture on my house...mind you, this could be because the deranged red squirrel who lives in the garden terrorizes every living thing within a mile to maintian her position as boss! She is the squirrel version of Frank Nitti! It would be very hard for ny of the birds, or the other squirrels, or the other assorted animals to compete. She is sitting on the window ledge punching the glass and making little noises halfway between a grunt and a squeak that I think are squirrel swear words! I am quite terrified of this little girl, however, on the other hand, she is one of the cutest things I've ever seen in my life!
Mari

You're saying she's the enforcer squirrel for an underworld rodent mafia. A raffia, if you will?!

Or is this squirrel the capo di tutti capi?

This answers so many questions about the grey squirrels in my neighborhood. When the guy across the street flew that Canadian flag during a hockey game, they were stepping gingerly around his property and "burying nuts" in the mulch. Do you think they were leaving tribute? Could her reputation have spread this far?

Look, I, I, I've already said too much...the last bird that squealed was fitted for a Chicago overcoat before the end of the day...I just, you know, you should have, ...a warning...

Weird piece I found in my EW this week. NBC is releasing the entire 13 episode run of the show "Kidnapped" that was pulled from the schedule only 5 shows in. They actually finished filming the entire season even after it was yanked and have released the DVD.

I know I've read how lousy the show's ratings were by some people in their posts and I lived through them from week to week. I was one of the 8 people who actually watched the show. I wonder if those posters actually bothered to watch the show or if they were just parroting the words of reviewers like that drip, Ausiello, from the TV Guide.

EW's review of the season gives it an A-.

Peachy, having NOTHING to do with your post...is that lovely new avatar a picture of one of your very own blooms in the garden? It is just stunning!

rowe

With the weather improvement, my DSL is letting me open another window....just managed to see the link. Ahhhhh! How did you know? Be honest, that's the wanted poster, isn't it! I knew it! There's probably a reward! Very good, very good!
Mari

Oh boy...don't get me started on the battle I've had and I'm still having with the avatar and personal photo. My control panel shows everything correctly, but when I get to the board the pictures are backwards! I gave up trying to get things to work. Yet, you seem to be seeing them correctly. That's interesting.

Any way I digress....The avatar is supposed to be a picture of a yellow, native flower here called Woodland Poppy. It is stunning, isn't it?! We planted some of these jewels a couple of years ago. I did not take this particular photo. The weird weather this year has confused our plants, so no blooms as of yet. The two varieties of native honeysuckle are blooming well though. AND the hummingbirds are here, enjoying both the honeysuckles and the feeders! What a hoot those little birds are!
Peachy

Hmmm. Yep, I see a yellow flower. And it IS stunning.

Speaking of small flying, buzzing things...I had a big, fat, furry yellow/black bumble bee whack itself into my office window several times today. That sucker was BIG and he kept hitting the glass so hard I started to fear he might bore his way right into my office. Thankfully, the glass is way too thick and hermetically sealed (as most offices are these days, boo!). But gosh, he must have had one heck of a headache!

rowe

One of the prettiest places I've ever been on my wild travels out west was the mountaintop observatory in New Mexico. Wild flowers everywhere, butterflies landing on people, elk just wandering through the compound, and hummingbirds.

I had never seen so many hummingbirds in my life! Every house had feeders and every house had hummer friendly flowers, so it was a paradise. They are the funniest, weirdest things imaginable. One buzzed me when I was walking home from the post office one afternoon and sounded for all the world like a cartoon character. This high pitched, buzzy sound. It followed me the entire way back to my house. Never did figure out exactly what it wanted. It was an interesting escort though.

Linda,

The people out west are lucky. They get more hummers (total numbers and different varieties) than any other part of the country. We get Ruby-throated hummers here. I saw a Rufus hummer once. They're not common.

Were you wearing brightly colored clothing the day the hummer escorted you home? They are fearless, feisty, very inquisitive birds. We have two feeders on the deck. I've had them come right up to me, within inches of my face, hovering in place, giving me a lengthy once over. (I was wearing a bright pink shirt at the time.) When they get worked up, declaring territorial rights over the feeders, they squeak and dive bomb each other, often missing us by just inches. (Until then, I didn't know hummers squeaked.) I've seen two of them locked in a beautiful aerial dance, squeaking incessantly at each other the entire time.

Peachy

Peachy, I hate say this, but I'm seeing a very handsome German (or Belgian?) Shepherd as your avatar

Ouch! poor bumblebee!. I don't mind them all that much, i don't annoy them, they don't annoy me though wasps are an entirely different matter. My six year old is pathologically terrified of them ever since she got stung last summer (she went to open the garden gate and didn't see the little bleep on the handle and got stung pretty badly) so anything that flies past her, be it a wasp, bee or any kind of flying insect then she goes into all out panic mode and runs back into the house as if the hounds of **** were after her, poor thing and nothing we can say or do to her helps It's not going to be fun around here this summer methinks!

Not me. I see a sunset with trees reflected in a lake. The shepherd is your personal picture if I view your profile though.

In Peachy's Profile, I'm getting the shepherd in both the Personal Photo and the avatar location (compressed a trifle horizontally - poor shep looks flattened.) No sunset, no trees, no wild mountain flowers

Ruby-Red, I'll have to side with your six year old on this. I normally run screaming from most everything that looks remotely like it stings - bees, wasps, yellow jackets, etc. I don't mind looking at fuzzy bumblebees, but from a safe distance. And I've never been stung, but I'm terrified that it will happen. Not sure why...

Hugs to your little one - tell her some grownups are big fraidy cats and I'll bet she's braver than me.

rowe

Fearless is an understatement. I was spending time on Kitt Peak, bunking with three other women in this beautiful house with the most picture postcard perfect view from our back deck. We noticed one of the other houses had inverted soda bottles hanging all around and introduced ourselves to the family living there. They were a lovely couple of astronomers who were leaving for a week to go to a conference and needed to find someone to keep their hummingbird feeders filled in their absence. We happily obliged, never expecting it to be the work that it was.

They had a huge plastic rubbermade container on their deck that was filled with 50 pound sacks of white sugar. Two liter soda bottles every 5 or 6 feet hung from each side of the house. Gallons of the sugar water were dispensed throughout the day.

Each feeder had a plastic margarine cup that was on the wire that hung the feeder from the roof to keep animals away I figured. Squirrels maybe?! The first feeder that I disconnected from its hanger to fill raises this buzzing, angry noise and this wee swordsman is flying at my face. There was a ruby throated hummer nesting in the margarine cup and he/she had come out to feed when I moved the bottle. A little warning would have decreased the comic relief for the other people with me and the fear factor for myself. There are these HUGE wasps living on the mountain and they are drawn to the feeders too.

Was I wearing colorful clothing the day I was escorted home? Probably not. Sweatshirts were the hot fashion item to wear at that altitude. Maybe it was my sweet disposition?! Yeah, I doubt that.

We did videotape a sword fight through a kitchen window when two males were sparing over territory one day. Incredibly feisty doesn't describe those little birds.

LMHO! This just proves my battle with the board pictures is far from over. Although, I have no idea how to correct the mess that's apparently going on!
Peachy

i like your new avatar, peachybc. it reminds me of my late mother and her beloved flowers in the garden. every time i see that avatar, gives brightening smile on my face

GOT it! Whatever you did, or didn't do, I've now got the yellow poppy avatar. But dancing Snoopy is wearing a German shepherd mask.

Kidding about the Snoopy. That poppy is so pretty. My red poppies are just coming in, but one of the three didn't survive the winter.

I didn't do anything, unless cursing at NBC and my computer counts! The correct Woodland Poppy flower suddenly appeared as my avatar late this afternoon. Me thinks NBC has got some technical glitches going on with the board.
Peachy

Hey you wanna curse out google pages for me .lmao

I haven't been able to put up a new tut in a long time .
I did manage yesterday to get my side panels neat and tidy but that's the extent.

Well, I saw the Poppy when you changed it from the fearless hunter, I can relate. For whatever reason, when I changed avatars from the Fiery Furnace to A Funny Thing Happened on the way to the Pantheon it was a night before it suddenly showed up. Wee bit glitchy. However, this way the avatar changes are even new to the owners!
Mari

My "small dog" would like to express her opinion that your avatar should, of course, be a picture of a German Shepherd. Of course, if I used her picture one day, I would have to use the other dog's the next, and that cat after that...so I'll stick with something neutral.

Think of it this way. Never knowing which avatar is going to pop up just gives you something interesting to look forward to.

I had a stunt bug wind surfing on my car this morning. Funniest thing to watch. I'm driving and realize that there's this dopey spider walking across the windshield of my car. As I speed up, its bracing against the wind, hunkering down, grabbing on (to what?!), trying its best to stick it out. Win one for the gipper, I guess? I'm almost cheering it on, while trying not to hit stuff while I'm driving to work. I've got theme music going through my mind, sort of a combination of Batman's cool jazzy trumpets with a lilty Gilligan's Island thrown in at the end when it finally gave up the effort and shot off into space. I imagine it was trailing a constant stream of silk behind my car like those tassels on my bicycle handlebars when I was a kid. Only more organic.

Blasted stupid thing. What is going through its arachnoid mind, setting up a web across the windshield of a parked car. Aren't there better places to catch insects?!

LOL Linda! That was a wonderful descriptive piece! Although, I feel a bit sorry for the spider, undergoing it's version of a NASA blast off from your car. lol
Peachy

I am SOOOOO not a cat person. So, of course a friend at work is asking me for information on determining the sex of three newborn kittens that her daughter's kids "brought home". Never actually knew someone who was followed home by an animal.

Anyone out there in Boardland know how old these kitties have to be before we can be definitely certain of the determination? I'm seeing some stuff on google (and will I burn in h'll for typing the words "sexing" and "kittens" into a search engine?!) that says immediately at birth vs. wait at least a few weeks.

By about 4 weeks the males will start to, erm, look a little like males. Unfortunately, I do mean little, since male domestic cats don't have much to brag about in that department even when they're mature. If their eyes are open and they're moving around on their own, try lifting the tail and having a peek (it may be easier to hold the kitten in your palm, on his/her back, while you attempt this).

But notice they make the most racket about their...equipment? This is not, however, restricted to male cats! More noise, less...well anyway, to add Cvl's point, then off to be spayed and neutered, if done asap no spraying, and no breast cancer for the girls. It's all good!
Mari

Actually, they don't start using their equipment 'til about 6 months, and most vets don't recommend spay/neuter until about 4 months at least.

And for the record, it's the females who make most of the noise. Male cats make noise when they square off, each hoping to intimidate the other and thus spare both from an actual fight. Females yell when mating because the poor little males are so...well, little. They have a tendancy to, um, fall out. So nature gave them little spines on their little p-, uh, you know. So they can, ah, hang in there 'til the job is done. This causes the female a fair amount of pain, so she hollers a good bit, and when the male finishes she usually turns around and beats the crap out of him (which does not deter her from approaching him again in about twenty minutes...some things do cross all species lines).

[Jeez, this is hard...God help me if I ever have to have the birds and the bees talk with an actual human child]

And adding to my own point: Yes, a trip to the vet is definitely in order, especially if you have other animals in the house, or plan on keeping these. Got to make sure the little fellas are healthy, and didn't pick up or inherit anything nasty before you got them.


Cvl, aka The Crazy Old Lady With All The Cats

Last night i had the tv on and was doing something in the other room when I heard this ad for CSI:NY. Something about it sounded vaguely familiar (but it was a new ep apparently). Anyways I don't watch that show but i was curious so i sat down. In the first few minutes, you know what I realized?

They ripped off the story from CI. Or at least part of it. It's like the writers took one ep of CI, chopped it up, threw in more boobs, bad actors, and gore and *Poof* they had an episode.

The ep they ripped it from was from this year too. I forget the name but it was the one with Lee Turgeson, Logan/Wheeler.

What was stolen, the whole russian/poisoning plot. Some guy at the beginning runs into the crime scene and was like "I need to report a murder!"

"This lady's?"
"No, mine!" And the guy collapsed.

Sound familiar? They even had a suspect (though short lived) who was Russian. There were a few other minor similarities but they didn't last long. But I'm convinced, b/c of how the guy reported his own murder, that the writers were looking at CI for good story ideas.

I mean, how can a show that does that remain on the air and CI may get the boot? I don't get it at all...

Anyways, I got about 40 minutes in and got sick of the ep but I was filled in later about who the killer was so I know it did differ a little from CI in that respect.

The 'barbs' are an amazing adaptation, really. Of course, they could have gone the other way and avoided the need...this is not only OT, this is kinda wierd! Funnily enough we used to live behind a fence which was the centre ring for the the cats to sing their little hearts out all night. My boy used to sit and look out the window, look back at me in horror, then resume staring. He has always been delicate! When the boys, er, mature a bit, they well, descend, and my little guy took to sitting off to the side! That is now it, for me, on this topic! Interesting as it is, poor Rowe, she is going to wonder what happened here!
Mari

Cvl, Mari and Peachy (who pm-ed),
Thanks from the bottom of my heart for ALL the information. Who knew reading about cats could be so much fun at this time of the morning?! I will pass along a PG version to my friend and her grandson (he's four) and see to it that they take the little babies to the vet when when appropriate to have them, um, snipped.

Who says you can't learn anything useful on the internet?! Oh, gosh that hurts!!!

Well, I'll be....the personal photo and avatar are finally correct! Have no idea when it happened or how.
Peachy

Ya just never know...who's on the other side of your pooter screen.
Peachy

I sent this to a friend whose name is Charles Boyce. He always thought he was an original.

I just got myself the best toy for getting rid of dandelions in my lawn. Yanks those suckers right out by the roots and gives you that good feeling you sometimes find yourself needing when all you want is a nice green lawn. I feel I understand my father so much better now.

Five years ago, B.H. (before house) I thought of dandelions as where Horton found his Whos. Like perfect yellow stars, twinkling in a sky of Kelly green. Tiny white novas of seeds, softly wafting on the faintest breeze!

Now? They're a blight on a lawn that otherwise looks like a retired person lives here. You know, perfect lines, perfect edging, beautiful green color, *screeching halt* DANDELIONS!!!!!!!!!!!!! My neighbor cultivates them from what I can tell. And she IS a retired person! Can't they do something to her for that?! Take away her AARP card? Make her pay full price at the diner!!! She yells to me over the fence, "Oh, Linda, your yard is always so lovely! Such color!!"

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Google weed hound.

Papa, can you hear me?!

Linda,

What a jewel of a post. Love that sentence! Having spent most of the day doing yard work, which included the abrupt, cruel death of weeds, with a choke hold grasp and a swift ripping of them from the comfort of their earthly delights....I hear you!!
Peachy

I did something like that today...only it was a 700 lb man from a couch in a third floor apartment (no, of course there wasn't an elevator - people who live in apartments with elevators apparently never need EMS).

Ummm.... How could I say this in a manner appropriate for a member of the world of medicine? Oh I know....



You know, if our Supersized eatin' a**es keep this up, windows of new buildings are going to be mandated to be cut to specific width specs and the hoyer lift people will be forced into a manufacturing partnership with John Deere!!!

Now - I consider myself a fairly empathetic woman; but there's a definite limit as to how far it goes. Unless you've found some quack that has you mainlining therapeutic steroids 'round the clock; there's no earthly uncontrollable excuse, man. H'll, even then, the immunosuppressing effect of the roids'd get you a monster, killing infection before hitting 350 from an acceptable BMI. Only other one is a four-man sized tumor you're afraid to get cut out. MAN! Just a greedy a** bunch of people on these shores...

Hey, Peachy I thought you might like this.

LOL Coastie. A fine pair, aren't they??
Peachy

Yes.. Yes I am pretty sure I have chatted with either one of these on the Net..scary. A good wakeup call to revealing personal details about yourself.

I find if I am asked a direct question about my marital status or the area I live, I get the person to reveal their details first, they will get annoyed and usually they log off or don't answer.

Well...to cut him a little bit of slack, he's hypothyroid, and at least 50 pounds of that was fluid (he hadn't peed in several days, despite 80 a day of Lasix). We couldn't push his limbs close enough together to fit him in the fire department's Stokes Basket - they were rock hard.

But, yeah, I have to agree with you on the rest. Especially since the day before I took a 600 pounder (with decub) out of a second floor apartment, while she screamed about how we all need to learn to accomodate fat people. I'm pretty sure it didn't occur to her that the whole community was "accomodating" her, since she tied up a fire crew and three ambulances for over an hour, leaving the rest of the town virtually without service.

OH. MY. GODS!!

I know this post is already two days old, but I'm late to the party as usual. Cvl, dear, you have me rolling around on the floor in absolute STITCHES!!! This is so very true, and yet very, very funny to read.

And one more vote for spaying. If the females get old enough to actually go into heat, they will keep you up all night with their moaning and groaning. "Caterwauling" I believe is the expression. The first kittens I adopted, some 20 years ago, both went into heat around the same time and I literally did not sleep for nearly a week until I got them "taken care of." Good golly, I never heard such noise before - plaintive, whining, wailing...and dragging their butts along the floor. (How was that for a great visual?)

Sorry, I'll go back into my corner and put the tin foil hat back on.

rowe

Remember Gossamer from the old Bugs Bunny cartoons? The big red monster with the bad hair and, "Look at those finganails!"



Imagine Gossamer is green and that's my spider plant! I've had it for four or five years now. It's spawned literally hundreds of baby spider plants that I've pushed off onto countless unsuspecting kindergarten children in the name of Mother's Day presents. I've had to split Gossamer twice already because she won't stop growing. I've tried neglect, really severe pruning, over watering, under watering, no sun, direct sun... My most recent harvest yielded 183 baby plants hanging off that mama in various states of growth on those freaky looking stems that grow out of the middle of I don't know where. She has been hanging from a nail on the potting shed for about a month now and has four new stems that I swear were NOT there yesterday and baby plants just spoinking into existence. I think I can hear them at night *spoink* *spoink*

Last summer, a baby spider fell into a huge Christmas cactus that was in a pot under Gossamer. When I realized it was there it had already reached a good 8 inches of leaf growth. A friend suggested I pull the thing out since they tend to overtake other plants in the same pot. When I pulled it up from the soil, this thing that looked like a dead man's hand, is hanging from the bottom of the plant! It was hideous. So of course, I couldn't look away. I wonder what is growing in the pot with that mother plant and now know why I can't kill it even with herbicides.

It's a pod.