WWQP Bulletin Board Chat

GOLDFINCHES

are favorites of mine. I'd never seen them til I came to NC. They are ubiquitous here. My experience has been that they eat as much of the sunflower seeds as the niger seed. Black oil sunflower seeds seem to attract my birds more readilly than anything else so I pretty much sitck to that at 40 lbs. at a time. I, too, store them in a garbage can of the metal kind so rodents can't penetrate. Trouble is that after the raccoons invaded last year and I lost the war. As I used more and more secure feeders (read that more expensive) they adapted and ended up destroying all but one of my feeders. I gave up and the birds think I don't love them anymore. Fortunately due to a restoration of rain in this area there is plenty of natural food for the birds but I miss being able to watch them out the windows in the kitchen and sewing rooms. I filled my remaining feeder yesterday and it is still intact this morning so time will tell. If you are lucky enough to have gold finches in the area along with cardinals and indigo buntings and see them at the feeder at the same time, you are lucky enough. I think I’ll set out the hummingbird feeders too. It’s late to convince them that they are welcome but they are greedy enough to give it a try I’m sure. I’ve also had butterflies come to my hummer feeders on rare occasions.

Rosey, the raccoons are notorious rabies carriers so it’s more than risk of treatable sickness when anyone including people has contact with their saliva. The dogs get their rabies shots (yours have I assume) but you and I haven’t. A health dept. person told me that when the dog has a tussle with a ‘coon it is very risky if you have contact with the dog even if it just the coat. On two occasions I’ve had the good fortune under those circumstances to have had no consequences. A healthy ‘coon is not normally out and about in the daytime so beware.

Heather, that is one beautiful grandson you have. Enjoy, but don’t spoil if you can manage that. Corrupting them is always possible though. I once had my granddaughter with me when I visited a must see quilt shop in East Rochester when she was barely 5. When we went in I told her that she could pick any fabric in the place and I’d make her a pair of shorts. This place, Patricia’s Quilt Shop if you’re ever in Rochester area, has a lot of wonderful stuff. There was a whole shelf full of ‘30s repros and Laura went straight to it with her arms spread as wide as possible and said, “I like these!” I heard some discreet chuckles from the cutting and check out area and looked up to see the benign smiles on the faces of the other grannies in the shop. I told them that I was corrupting her behind her mother’s back.” More chuckles and approving nods from the witnesses ensued. Laura got her shorts and everyone including me was vey happy. Grandchildren are truly gifts of nature, God or whatever. For her 16th birthday next year I am going to have Al’s wedding band along with my wedding set made into a pendant for her. The boys are telling me that they hope to pack her up with them and drive down here for a week during the summer. Oh how I long for such a visit. That’s the only gift I need from them.

Tenneh, your life sounds chaotic to this tired old broad. You daughter is another cutie. I hope her recovery goes well and that she’s back on the horse soon. It’s a lesson that’s best learned early in life and she’s literally there sooner than most of us before we have to learn to “get back on the horse.”

Doris you efforts sound downright exhausting. When you are through with your chaos and have learned to love it come a bit east to the mountains were I have plenty more for you to have fun with.

Dinner guests tonight so I need to get going here. There’s a ton of food in the house but the local strawberry season is upon us and it never lasts long enough to suit me so I have to trek to town to get some. The local grocery never buys locally so their berries come from CA and it ain’t the same stuff. They’ve just had some locally produced lettuce this spring so let’s hope they are changing their policy to one of buying local produce.

Jane in NC

posted by Jane in NC @ 7:26 AM