June is just ticking along!

In the smoke, and the need for indoor play, I began doing Sudoku. It is an app, but I have been unable to do the ones on paper. This is great as it tell me if I've made a wrong move. It is exactly what I need right now: success. 

🔥 Canada has been blessed with partners from various parts of the world, recently 1296 firefighters are here or on their way. This totals 5,000 firefighters who have sent to assist from around the world, including South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand. We are so grateful. 

• The US has sent 600 firefighters.
• A battalion of 350 firefighters from the EU are headed to Quebec.
• France sent 109 firefighters. 
• Portugal sent 140.
• Spain another 97 firefighters.

Thursday brought more smoke to our area. We saw the sun, after a few days of welcome rain, but I had to close up the house. Friday we have a bit more smoke. It's supposed to get up to 5 on the scale, of 10, but I will be vigilant. The recent rains helped, but we aren't done yet.

🌧 It's now been a few days of rain. I actually washed floors. I'd put it off in the nice, hot weather, preferring to go outdoors. After several days of rain, I had no excuse. JB went into town for a couple of hardware store items. One important one, we didn't have the number of our house on our mailbox. Canada Post had done inspections along our route. He bought us some shiny new numbers, which I put on yesterday. I rubbed off the side of the mailbox with rubbing alcohol to clean it.

Speaking of rubbing alcohol, I found a tick on myself yesterday afternoon. It was plucked off with tweezers, and hastily dropped in the tick jar with rubbing alcohol. I could feel the itch. It is a nymph, a new hatch this year. The bites aren't as bad as the blackflies, honestly, and it wasn't on me long.

We aren't doing too badly with ticks. One year, Daisy brought in 200 that I plucked. The vet's goop we put on them really helps. You have to be aware. I knew the itch was a bad sign.

 

In the meantime, we'll have to clean the gutters. The kids are coming tonight. My SIL, JL, has promised to help, again. Bless his heart!

full rainy gutter from Jennifer Jilks on Vimeo.

Also, I'm working on a support for the orchid and the cherry tomatoes. I've been trying to figure out how to support the orchid. There is one bamboo "U" in the planter, but it keeps falling over. Can you count the blossoms? It is looking really healthy since I brought it indoors. 

 

I ordered the green one (below, left) for the orchid, and we may get it June 23rd. Or not!  JB bought me some dowels for a home-made one for the cherry tomatoes. 

This is what I accomplished. I am sure there is a better way to tie them, but I didn't check that out on YouTube! When/if it gets bigger, I can add another row of horizontal dowels. We've a couple of tomatoes near to being ripe!

The cats go out for a run, catch a rodent, and come back in. They don't like the bugs.

The bugs are still keeping them close to home, which is good. They come in hungry, usually. 

 

Cinnamon on the rails from Jennifer Jilks on Vimeo.

The cardinals seem to be nesting, again. He is singing at the top of his wee beak. I am hoping phoebe finds another nest location. You can hear them singing. 

 

Phoebe nesting? from Jennifer Jilks on Vimeo. 

I'd prepared this prior to going out doors Thursday morning. Thursday afternoon, I found these!

Fires, rain, indoor games

🔥Well the fires are still firing across Canada. Our smoke has gone. Thankfully. The numbers are slowly evolving. There are some fires they simply do not fight, as they have to prioritize them, with limited crews. 

 "Canada lost 30,000 firefighters over the past six years, according to a national survey."

Canada is a nation of volunteer firefighters🚒. Apparently 70% are volunteers. The big cities have permanent, paid staff, but our rural areas rely on men and women to drop everything and go fight a fire. They've gone from 156,000 firefighters (2016) across Canada to 126,000 (2022), as the economy and the nature of the work evolves. Most calls are NOT for fires (medical, environmental, accidents): only 10% were actual fires. There are shortages in budgets, affecting equipment, and training.🧯

Our PM visited Ukraine. More money, more sanctions. Something needs to be done. Perhaps Ukraine joining NATO will make a difference. 

PM Trudeau, Freeland in Ukraine

🌧 We had 4.8 mm (0.19") rain yesterday afternoon. Praise Be!  That is only 7mm this month, so far. We need a long day of rain. In 2020 we only had 29mm rain, whereas there were two years we had 150+ mm.

During the smoky days we've spent our time indoors, although the last couple of days have been cloudy and cooler. I was happy to get outdoors Saturday and Sunday.

Fred has been gathering nesting materials:

On Friday we went into Perth and had our booster shots for COVID. I booked it online. Our last shots were October. 

When we came out of the store, I spotted this car, licence plate: PLAINFUN! Snazzy car, for someone!

Friday, June 9th Phoebe has fledged! I went to check on them and two flew away. There were none left, so I am going to assume we had at least survive. They have been checking the nest for remainders! I was going to be able to load up the wood, but I forgot about the cardinal nest in the lilac tree. I checked it Saturday, all gone. I guess I should have been more vigilant. 

The cardinals are gone!

Nutmeg has been out. She caught herself a rodent, and threw up some guts on the front sidewalk. At first I couldn't figure out why the crow was flying by and/or perching in the tree. They must have a good sense of smell. Here she was checking out a bedside table.

On a happier note: I've been having fun figuring out the panoramic setting on the phone. I took a regular photo of the most recent Bears, but you can see how good the panorama is showing 🧸Snuggle Bears🐻!

This is a regular photo:

The panoramic image is far better↓. The signage says, BEARVILLE ANNUAL ART SHOW! (Grampa was inspired by the art show at the Ottawa girls' high school, they put photos on the family photo stream!)

Robin red-breast nesting progress

Wood duck has hatched and fled; Phoebe's have fledged 5, but laid 4 more eggs in the same nest. A robin decided to join her in the shed.

The robins are on their second nesting. This is their story, starting with the most recent sighting.

July 3

After I spooked the last one out of the nest, accidentally, they are hanging around. I walked down the hill, and here she was, trying to lead me away. I could not, for the life of me, find the fledgling in the tree above, although I could hear it!

momma robin from Jennifer Jilks on Vimeo.

July 2 – Last one, and they are all gone!

June 26 – 4 babies

June 20 – hatched

Baby robin from Jennifer Jilks on Vimeo.

June 12th – still 4 eggs!

June 7th – Four eggs

June 6th – three eggs

June 5th – Another egg, back in the shed location

June 4th – first egg

Sadly, when I checked later, it had't come back and the egg was cold. We saw them thinking about building a nest in the tree in front of the window. 

I took this with the snakescope.

robin's egg from Jennifer Jilks on Vimeo.

June 2

It's tricky to photograph, as the shed is pretty dark. 

 

June 1st – Progress

The shed is a busy place. I'm keeping up with the phoebe incubation process. She's still there. I was distracted by the dead grass hanging down.

 

Then there is the deck. I was working out one day, in the basement, and I could see a robin. It was up in the rafter, here, and kind of stamping its feet, almost testing out the beam. It disappeared, then, a few days later it was apparently trying out all of them.
If you look closely, you can see the dead grass in each space!
Sadly, all of these locations will get wet in the rain.

Spring unfolds as it should: Ospreys on the nest

What a delight. Near us, on the highway, we have a pair of Ospreys nesting. They had two babes last year. We'll see what this year brings.
 

They were endangered, in the 50s and 60s. Human ignorance of DDT and the poisons we put into the environment. Thankfully, these beautiful birds are soaring again.

On an aimless drive, which ended up on backroads, as well as a late lunch at The Cove, I spotted an Osprey with a fish. With water still frozen on most of our lakes, I wondered where on earth it found this large fish. Ask a question on the Lanark Birds Facebook group, get an answer: flowing rivers that are spawning grounds!

More meme critters #70