A GOOD MORNING

There were no birds outside, then a squall came up with intense snow.
I walked out to fetch the paper while I could still see, and the deer were emerging from their secret sleeping place in the choke cherries beyond the garage. I stayed back and let them run.
Now that the wind has settled down a bit, the pheasants are out in force, and the evening grosbeaks are making their rounds.
A good morning

LIFE OF A BRUSHPILE

After 12 years of only part time living in Montana, there was a lot of trimming to do. Doug attacked the choke cherry bushes and trees with tools old and new. Serious conversations were held with our neighbor about the best brush cutter.
The brush pile might have been temporary, but then, small birds took refuge from hawks and winds. Pheasants joined them. Soon, rabbits were hopping in and out as the pile grew apace with Doug’s efforts to control nature. All of this could be watched from the kitchen window.
The hops below the window grew mightily each year, until Ruth cut and pulled them away from the small trees, the stone wall and the gutters. She dragged the hops to the brushpile, since it was close by. She wasn’t very neat.
The winter of 2018-2019 began on September 30, and continued until the end of April. The white tail deer were gaunt. Any vestiges of dry grass had disappeared. Slowly, the brushpile began to diminish. Then, the basic stick and branch structure disappeared. The deer did survive, stealing sunflower seeds and cracked corn from the birds.
We will feed the brushpile, so that our friends can live.

We were told that Missouri families were often split apart during the Civil War. We did not realize that our parents were talking about our family and our great grandfather.

One day, doing a casual search, I came upon his name and photo on Find-a-Grave. The old man in the photo looked like my father. This was James M “Crow” Hogue. Other things started to make sense – the tintypes of people that we didn’t know and why our grandfather was listed alone in the 1890 census at 10 years old. There were just too many kids at home.

Apparently, returning wounded from the Civil War, Crow was no longer welcome at home. He did find a wife, and had 10 children over the years. He supported them by hunting birds and other game. I regret that he was likely a participant in the mass extinction of birds in 19th century America.

Swallows Return to Gallatin Gateway

Joyous morning — as I walked out to fetch the newspaper (about 1/4 mile round trip), swallows were flying around selecting homes! On the way back, I was asking myself, but what will they eat? Just then, I walked through a cloud of tiny insects. They must have wintered over and erupted at the same time the birds started to arrive. Was this a plan?

But why is their arrival such a big event in our lives?

Several years ago, Doug made a few dozen bluebird houses. He gave some to friends and posted the others. Nary a bluebird. However, some birds this city girl had never seen began to make a community at our place.  We found that swallows are remarkably tolerant of us, and make great families. When their first chicks grow up, they help feed the second set of chicks to hatch. To feed all of them requires a lot of insects. We had very few mosquitoes. When we began sleeping outside full time, only three mosquitoes bothered us in the first season. This also gave us a platform to watch their aerial acrobatics, flying down the ridge, eating as they go.

At the end of last season, I noticed that almost 100 swallows had gathered in the trees and bushes near the garage. The next day, they were gone. Was it a meeting? How do they know?

We clean the houses very carefully in late fall so that they will return to us. We love them.