Not very many.

Not very many of these old wood barns still stand in my part of the world. So many have been knocked down and burned up in order to free up a few thousand (sometimes a few more hundred) more square feet for growing a cash crop. I have driven past this one for almost ten years, and hold my breath every time I drive in its direction.

A good roll.

There is nothing like a roll in the grass.

Nope, not sleeping.

Nope, nope not at all.

Squiggly.

insects wrote squiggly lines on this tree trunk.

Insects wrote squiggly lines in this tree trunk.

Gleaned.

These Downy Woodpeckers gleaned every last reachable bit from the feeder before I could refill it.

Dinner was served.

Nachos! Avocado, sliced jalapeno from the garden, a tomato from the local organic farm, cheese, and lentil chili underneath it all. With sour cream on the side.

It was delicious.

Swanlings

I understand that the correct word for young swans is cygnets. Nonetheless, since young ducks are called ducklings and young geese are called goslings, I often think of young swans as swanlings.

Here are four Mute Swan swanlings with their parents. It is interesting that three of them are grey morphs. It was also interesting that they did not move away when a companion and I appeared from behind a screen of phragmites.

Disk.

The sun was little more than an orange-red disk on this hazy, smoky, foggy morning.

Naturalized.

Our municipality’s Council recently approved a bylaw amendment to allow naturalized areas in residential areas.

Don’t tell anyone (shhhh), we have had naturalized areas in our yard for years now. This bed in our front yard is full of Purple Coneflower (background), Tickseed (foreground), and Gaillardia (out of the frame). While I can broaden my knowledge of insects in general and pollinators in particular, I am certain our yard is friendlier to pollinators than that of almost all of our neighbours who have (mostly) turfgrass and imported ornamentals.

We also let dandelions go, probably to our neighbours’ chagrin.