83. Can't Count 84 or 85

Gotta love fall migration. Our walk Sunday brought us 83: Black-throated Gray Warbler spotted in a lovely area near the river. And we also saw two new (to us) species but we can't officially count them because we are not 100% certain of our identification. The not-84 was either a Dusky or a Hammond's Flycatcher - these two species are very similar and I guess we're just not up enough on our flycatchers. Not-85 was a possible blue-winged teal sitting all by her lonesome.

Old Pots. Also Number 82

Spotted this week was a Northern Mockingbird, not a rare bird but new for us here. My delight at tallying our 82nd species here at Dryad Ranch was dampened by the fact that when spotted, it was busy poking its beak into one of our ripening pomegranates.

Even so, we're rather fond of mockers. Some years at our Bay Area place we had a mocker begin to imitate the sound of a whirligig my father had made for us and that we had placed on top of the garden shed.

This photo is of some old cookpot found in a box near a picnic spot on the other side of the river.

Weekends at Dryad Ranch

We got done all sorts of chores done yesterday. Dino put a temporary fix on a toilet that decided to start running/leaking. I did all the regular housecleaning stuff. After lunch we went into the garden to discuss how we want to arrange things and after that we just started drifting into doing little things out there that looked like they needed doing. I fell into a zennish trance of weeding.

Around 4, I found Dino"resting his eyes" on the front porch swing and decided to take a little walk. I laced up, grabbed the camera and headed up Ant Hill. From there I swung around to Altar Rock, which is my favorite spot on the place. There is a spring there and just above it is a very large rock upon which another large rock sits, altarlike. It's a very special spot and I go there on almost all of my solitary walks in that direction.

Just below the spring, I found bees enjoying sips from a small pool covered in duck weed.

From there, I climbed Deer Ridge in a straight shot uphill, found a good dozen or so bluebirds busily hunting bugs, then I dropped back down to the road and started the full loop around the Northwest Territory.

Finally, I made my way to Dino's favorite spot under the Oregon Ash and the little pool there. I really got munched by mosquitoes as usual. While I was sitting and waiting hopefully for a bullfrog to show up for a photo op, I was greatly alarmed by rather loud rustling footstep noises behind me. I whirled to start my defense, only to scare the crap out of about thirty wild turkeys who hadn't been aware of me either! They ran off about twenty feet to the other side of the river, then stopped and started milling about in a standard turkeyish way, talking amongst themselves. After not seeing the turkeys during the summer months, we've seen them the last couple of walks and have noticed evidence of them, in great scratched up patches in the ground under the oaks in that area.

When I got back to the house, I found it was three hours later. Since I hadn't intended to be gone that long, I really had to start hustling to get dinner ready.

Don't Tell My Boss

Although I am not completely enamored with my daily commute into the nearest town to hole up in my solitary office, look at the view I am treated with every morning!

We all know that I am toiling away, nose to the grindstone, work work work. Right?

We'll Have to Be Careful In the Morning

This little snake, who appeared to have recently eaten, wasn't fond of us trying to document his or her presence. It finally took off, sidewinding at a good clip, only to disappear somewhere inthe vicinity of the front porch. We lack the snake charming, er rather, snake catching skills of our neighbor, so will have to resort to crossing our fingers that it finds a better venue soon.




We've both been ever so busy, even after two weeks (and doesn't time fly?), with organizing and unpacking. Who knew that we'd accumulated so much "stuff"?



I have gotten my little office all set up and have been diligently driving to town every morning to do my telecommuting. I'm rather pleased with it all, the DSL speed provided is quick indeed. I had a bit more excitement than I would have preferred last week when the restaurant downstairs had a bit of a fire, which rumor had it, was caused by some careless cigarette-smoking workers and a stack of cardboard boxes. It was all very chaotic and let me tell you I boogied right on out of there. There wasn't much damage evidently, luckily, but that was all just a bit much on top of having to smell all the smoke from the Big Meadows fire.

At Dryad Ranch Fulltime

We've been here more than a week now and haven't quite had a chance until today to start enjoying it. It's been insanely busy with getting organized and finding things that were so well-packed as to be virtually unfindable. There are still pockets of mess but mostly it's all coming together nicely.

There were a couple of truly grueling days of loading and then unloading. We had some fun getting Dino's workbench out of the rental truck - nothing like a little machinery to make life easier.

The air has been pretty bad the last few days with smoke from the Big Meadows fire, although not as bad as last year. This didn't stop us from taking a bird walk today; the highlight of the walk was a golden eagle soaring over Morning Meadow.

Fly Away Home

I do know that the poem is about ladybugs, but I didn't have any handy for this post. However, I just want to crow about the fact that we are finally moving to Dryad Ranch for good, and yes, it does feel that we are flying home.

In spite of the gloom and doom about the economy, our Bay Area house sold in no time (knock on wood because escrow hasn't close yet, don't want to jinx anything).

The dragonfly is a Western Pond Hawk.