Earth Laughs in Flowers, and beavers and buzzards!

It was raining a bit as I stepped outside with the dogs this morning, but that is not what I noticed. I paused at the first step out of the door - from there I could see a myriad of blossoms: honeysuckle, purple sand cherry, lilac, apple, little periwinkle flowers down at the ground, with a bleeding heart blossoming right over it. As I stepped away from the house I could see the 6 apple trees lining the laneway - all covered in white blossoms. Two more lilacs came into view, as well as the hawthorn, which was also in blossom. A bunch of pink tulips were poking through the grass along the laneway. Marvelous!

I know I've mentioned my windows in the kitchen and how it is amazing that I still have all my fingers from all the gawking that I do. Today I was making our smoothies and noticed ripples in the pond. I peered out the window to see if the ducks were swimming around, but couldn't see anything. I saw more ripples so grabbed the binoculars. I still couldn't see anything, and then suddenly from the depths of the pond emerged something big. Really big. A beaver! We watched it for a few moments then I grabbed my camera and we all headed outside. I got a quick photo of it before it disappeared underwater again. We waited for a while, but they can stay submerged for 15 minutes. It was raining and cold so we didn't wait for more than 5 or 10 minutes. Meanwhile I let the dogs run around the pond, hopefully making the beaver look for a safer domicile.

A little later I was sitting at my desk and out of the corner of my eye noticed a large black bird flying around. I looked up and there on the roof of the barn were 4 big, really big, birds. Out came the binoculars. They were turkey vultures! One by one they flew off, swooping around as they left.

What an exciting day for wildlife sightings - we've never seen a beaver here, nor have we had a family of turkey vultures roosting on the barn!

Earth laughs in flowers.

Ralph Waldo Emerson