Rainy 45 degree rather dreary day. However, some neighbors came to visit for a while in our front yard. I prefer these visitors rather than the stinky black bear neighbors or the mountain lions that all the neighbors have seen except me.
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Cool! Blacktails, right? They look...delicious...
Exactly 40 degrees cooler here...snowing for about two days straight, lightly but consistently. Pond is frozen over hard enough to walk on, will be frozen solid to the bottom by Christmas. I've put out our heated birdbath, which is a much-needed source of open water for birds and other critters during the winter. Winter finches have arrived here at the feeders: Evening and Pine Grosbeaks, Redpolls, Crossbills. The big DIY suet feeder in the yard has just been filled up with fresh deer fat and is attracting several species of Woodpecker, including the incredible Pileated Woodpeckers, my favourite. We are currently going through a 50-pound bag of sunflower seed each week; fortunately, the local bears are now in deep sleep in their dens, so I no longer need to bring all the feeders (we have 9 for sunflower and 4 for suet/peanuts) inside each night. Feeders require thorough cleaning and disinfection every couple days due to the incidence of avian flu this year.
I'm allowed one deer per year up here, got mine two days ago, so now I can begin putting out deer feed for the winter; can't feed them before hunting season because it is considered baiting, which is illegal here. We have one gnarly-antlered atypical whitetail buck skulking around; I am looking forward to searching for his weird sheds next spring.
