Nests Revealed

Ever since the trees lost their leaves with the autumn, I’ve been poking about and mentally cataloguing the nests around the farm. Over the weekend I had the opportunity to capture a few during a lovely sunrise to share with you today.

I'm not sure which nest belongs to which creature, but there are quite a few small birds' nests in the hedge, snuggled happily in the thorny Multiflora rose canes. The larger and higher nests of the latter two images likely belong to the gray squirrels.

While you’re enjoying these pictures from my walk, I’m working on drafting up what I learned during my interview last week with Director of the Open Space Preservation Department in Chester County. I can’t wait to share!

Beneath the old tree

One of the first trees to catch my eye upon my first visit to this property is an old tree, species as yet unknown to me, which grows along the driveway a ways up from my cottage. It has beautiful burls and tons of character, and appears to drop nuts in the autumn (based on the casings I've found in the leaf litter).

Reaching out in many directions, this tree is a challenge for me to photograph – there is no way I can get it all in one shot unless I stand far away, which means you can’t enjoy the detail. While I work out just how to share it with you, please enjoy what I found beneath it: the first flowers of the season, and somebody’s root-home.

The flowers look like what I know to be buttercups, except they aren’t growing like buttercups! The buttercups I know grow tall and bushy like herb robert, with broad, dark, fuzzy greens. These buttercups hug the ground and bear a sort of an “Elizabethan neck frill” of green leaves. They are a beautiful and welcome sight, nonetheless.

As for the little root-burrow, I have no idea who lives here! However, I have seen foxes, rabbits, mice, and other burrowing creatures in the area. I suppose I’ll have to scout before sunup to learn just who calls this quiet nook home.

Of birds and trees

I’m pretty sure that this is an abandoned bird’s nest, as I have found many similar little nests in the thickets and young trees around the area. This one is located just outside one of my porches, and I am hopeful that the builders will return!

Outside my writing window, there is a lot of bird activity in the supposed-Eastern white pine. Among the bright and the beautiful who roost here, I’ve taken a real fancy to my newest neighbors: a pair of doves.

Now, I’m no ornithologist, but at least I know an eagle from a seagull. While this lovely couple is not the cliché white dove, they have the mannerisms, shape, and coo of doves with which I am familiar. I suppose that until I get myself a book, I can’t say for SURE that they are doves.

In Seabeck we had some amazing doves whose wings crack-crack-CRACKED when they flew about. I could count on seeing them perched on hemlock tops around my house before the sun broke the treeline each morning. As soon as I made too much noise, off they’d fly – crack-crack-CRACK!

The two outside my window arrived a few days ago, after the snow melted. They come by at the same time each morning – around 10 after six – and sit on the same branch. There they preen, coo, twitter, flutter their wings, perform a little affectionate “beaking,” and occasionally get in a little practice with the ol’ one-on-one.

I’m trying not to hope so hard as to scare them off, but today when I saw them playing in the upper branches, I started to get REALLY excited that they might have settled on my tree for their nest-to-be! I should go scatter some of my comb leavings and dog-fur out there just in case!