backyard – Page 6

Templeton Says Goodbye

Memory is a fickle thing. I’ve been editing old images in with the new so I can bring some old blog posts back online and was ready to update the picture of Templeton watching the dying light late on a summer evening in 2007. I was a bit dumbfounded to find I had never put the picture online, though I seem to remember doing so. I even remember the name of the post! I looked at the old site though and it was nowhere to be found, I guess I meant to post it, wrote the post in my head, but never got around to it. Better late than never.

Dove Tales

I’ve taken many pictures of white-winged doves out on the trails but this one is from our backyard as the sun sank low in the sky. If I could only see them one place my preference would be to see them in the wild, but I’m thankful I get to see them at home as well. We get four dove species in our yard (five if you include pigeons), not just white-wings but mourning doves, Eurasian collared-doves (a pair), and on rare occasion a single Inca dove. Seeing them together I can get a feel for their different sizes, as well as see the young after they’ve fledged (none nest in our yard). Mostly though I just enjoy seeing and listening to them every day.

We are not the only ones mesmerized by the doves. All three cats are currently watching out the sliding glass door into the backyard. Trixie in particular loves watching them, a mourning dove has been brave enough to come close to the house and Trixie starts chirping like Emma used to, her tail whipping back and forth furiously. I wish Emma had lived long enough to make it to Arizona with us, she was our most devoted bird-watcher.

The In-Between Time

I took many pictures of Sam sleeping atop the cat tree over the years and only through the greatest restraint have I avoided sharing each and every one of them with you. It is the day this picture was taken that packs the emotional punch for me, two days before the movers were to pack our things and load them onto a truck, three days before we would leave for Arizona, five days before we would arrive. He knew something was up but he had no idea how much I was about to upend his world.

A simple picture of Sam sitting in a chair with his name writ large on his collar. But I know the chair was in my office because the junk haulers took away my old couch that morning and I brought down my old chair from our bedroom, a chair we bought when we moved into the house and which served me well for many years (and serves us well even now). It was a delight to photograph Sam in it as it reminded me of when Templeton loved to sleep there, especially after he lured me out of it so he could steal my spot. The collar though he and the other cats only had to wear in the days leading up to the move, and during, and after, in case they got loose during the confusion.

Thankfully they did not. This story ends in joy not tragedy.

A picture of Sam sleeping on the bed, I took many of those too, but it was only our bed for a night as this was the hotel in California on our first night, the in-between place in the in-between time. A reminder of a long trip, especially for the little ones, but a reminder too that as long as we were together we would be all right.

A quick picture of Ellie that I snapped after we arrived at our rental house in Arizona at the end of March. The house will be home for a year, Arizona for much longer, and I am so thankful we found the house and that our lovely landlords accepted all the pets. All of the hiking and swimming has been great for me, I’m in the best shape I’ve been for a long time. The one story house has been great for Ellie as she can now follow us everywhere we go. As for Sam, well, our little snuggler has been putting on weight as he no longer has to go to the basement to use the litter box, the main floor to hang out in my office, and upstairs to join us at night. He’s getting a reduction in food to slowly bring his weight back down. Trixie and Boo are doing just fine, they love watching the wildlife in our back yard.

Time to Relax

Ellie relaxes by our backyard pool on April 1st, our first full day in Arizona. She was able to relax after a long three day drive from Oregon but I wasn’t so lucky as I was starting work the next day. I was already worn out from the stress and pace of the previous months but since then I have been able to relax on the weekends, my wife has been taking care of the day-to-day stuff at home and we have yard and pool maintenance for the outside and a nice landlord if things need attention on the inside, freeing me up to go hiking pretty much every morning I have off.

Even for that a few weeks ago I hit a wall where I knew I needed to take some time off, but unfortunately it was an especially busy time at work, each week busier than the next, culminating in a week with a couple of very late nights and little sleep. Things are slowing down now so starting on Wednesday I will take a week of vacation, not going anywhere just need some downtime. I still haven’t fully unpacked my office.

One bright side of being laid off was I took Ellie on long walks every morning and not just on the weekends. I started the long weekend walks in her elderly years when she wanted to cut our evening walks short but I realized she’d still go on long walks in the morning. The downside is my hiking took a nosedive during those years as the mornings were my trail time as well, but I don’t regret it, you never know how much time you’re going to get with these old pups and each of those walks was precious to me.

Since my wife has been home in Arizona she has been walking Ellie in the mornings so I’ve gone out hiking most of my days off. I do miss walking with the pup though, the past week I’ve been getting up early on work days and my wife and I walk her together, we walked for 1.4 miles this morning. We should all age so well. We can’t convince her to get in the pool though, she loved to swim when I took her to the rivers in Portland but I think the step into the pool is the issue, steps are a big problem for her these days (thankfully the rental house has none).

I need to teach her to jump in! Maybe I’ll wrap some bacon around my head and stand in the middle of the pool.

A Father’s Day

Then Jesus told them this parable: “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Does he not leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep’.”
Luke 15:3-6

A month ago I thought I saw a mouse running along the fence in our backyard but to my horror realized it was a baby Gambel’s quail. A male and female had been bringing their eight (!!!) tiny chicks to our backyard but somehow this little one had gotten isolated from its family who were nowhere to be seen. Life is hard for wildlife, even in backyards, especially so for the young. I thought this story would end in heartache.

I refilled the bird feeder in hopes it would attract the parents and spread out some of the small feed the chick could eat in various places where it could feed away from the larger birds. Eventually it went over to the bird feeder and started following a towhee around, who was rather annoyed with this little chick that wouldn’t leave it alone.

It was hard to watch. Then dad flew in.

He settled in under the feeder and sheltered the little chick with his body. The scared little chick began to relax, sometimes hiding completely under its father and sometimes venturing out to feed, but never out from under his shadow.

I was relieved until the father led the chick over to the corner of the yard and leapt up onto the little retaining wall and then onto the larger wall behind, trying to get the chick to follow. The chick was far too young not only for flight but even to jump, so all it could do was chirp at its father and frantically run beside the wall. This went on repeatedly until I thought the father would abandon the chick and return to the rest of the family in their nest somewhere in the neighborhood. Instead he settled into the corner of the yard, laying down in the gravel with the chick safely underneath. Eventually the chick got enough courage that it began to playfully run up dad’s back until it finally settled under its father for good and they spent the night in our backyard.

They were gone before I got up for work (the side gate has a gap plenty large enough for the chick to get under, that’s how they were getting in and out of the yard before). The gang of eight (and mom and dad) are regular visitors to our feeder (they’re there now as I type this), the chicks grew impossibly quickly and are now about the size of the adults and can not only hop but fly. In the early days mom and day would chase all the other birds away from the feeder to allow their chicks to feed but the youngsters are bold and old enough now that the parents allow the other birds to stay.

On this Father’s Day, a story of a terrified child saved by his devoted father. But on this day too my government tears children from their parents at our borders. Defends it with Bible quotes, like the Christian slavers before them.

We need not be monsters, America. Let’s save those who are lost, and rejoice in it.

To California

I photographed this California scrub-jay in our backyard in 2005, back when it was known as a western scrub-jay. The species was split into two in 2016, the California is who you’ll usually see in Oregon. Emma was particularly fond of the large, gregarious birds like jays, crows, and flickers, so if she was on watch I always knew when one landed in our backyard.

If Two is Company and Three is a Crowd, What is Four?

Four purple coneflower blossoms grow close together in our garden. I’ve propagated several patches around our yard as this is my favorite flower, but this old patch from when we first moved in continues to be the most vigorous. I don’t deadhead them late in the fall so the birds can eat the seeds during the winter, as the juncos are doing now.

One Year Ago Today

Exactly one year ago we were supposed to get a little bit of snow, a rarity for us, so I stayed home from work so I could take the pup out in whatever we got. We’d get quite a bit of snow a month later, not like the dusting here, but of course I had no way of knowing that. A biting wind made our outing less enjoyable than it might have been but I was still thankful for the chance to take Ellie out in the snow. Today was also a bit of a rarity weather-wise, cold but sunny, as it has been all week. No pictures from today, I had a meet-and-greet with a potential employer and was tied up all morning so we had to forego the long walks that have been a staple of our mornings since I got laid off a month ago.

Gray and Green

Templeton in 2006 exploring the backyard. I used to give the cats supervised time in the fenced backyard but don’t do it anymore, it was easier then with just the two of them and the yard more closed off. Everything in this picture has changed. Templeton died a year later. I dug up the mint and raspberries years later (but they keep coming back). There’s a wildflower garden there now.

Tag: backyard