Winter 'Gardening'

Winter Sunrise 

The 'gardening' is limited to indoor things right now, due to the extreme weather outside at this time of the year.  We had the most glorious 10 days of early November weather! It was wonderful to go out for a walk, with only a light jacket or fleece, no mitts or ear warmers required!

Then overnight we were hit hard with the opposite extreme. A deep freeze with snow almost every day which lasted almost 2 weeks. But we all survived that and now things are pretty much back to normal early December weather;  Nice enough to walk the dog along the deer trails around here as long as you are wearing snow pants, warm jacket, scarf, hat and mitts.

Through the kitchen window...

Looking for sunflower seeds the birds have dropped.

The deer are out in droves this time of the year. It is rutting season right now so a person has to be very carefully driving at this time. The deer often dart out in front of the vehicles trying to cross the road at the wrong time!  But I enjoy watching them feed on the hills around our acreage.

Mom and spring baby

We have 2 bird feeders which we fill with oiled sunflower seeds year round for the numerous birds out here. It is especially important in the winter when the food is scarce. The black capped chickadees are here all winter along with little downey woodpeckers, the odd nuthatch, magpies and blue jays. The bohemian waxwings often make appearances in huge numbers, but they are here to glean the dried saskatoons and chokecherries or mountain ash berries.  

The ladder back woodpecker and the blue jays are very aggressive at the feeders and for some reason they throw huge amounts of sunflower seeds on the ground. They seem to think there is just the perfect one in the pile somewhere.... The deer have discovered this little treasure trove and they come to check the ground under the feeders every day. I'm always thrilled to see them outside my window cautiously cleaning up the seeds they discover there. Sometimes I will even put extra seeds in an old baking pan near the feeder for them to eat. Of course luring them to our yard this way has its drawbacks come gardening time in the spring....

Mom and twins searching for seeds

Time to go!