"the church"

[Julia]

Spent the week up at the church again (our "cottage", a hundred year old church near Madoc).
The feeder was slow except for grackles and blue jays, but many of the bug eaters are back.  A Nashville Warbler taunted me for three days from just behind the tree line until I finally saw and ID'd him, but we also had Black and White and Yellow Rumped in the apple tree.

I put up the hummingbird feeder and had two males fighting for rights to it until they worked out a mutually condusive schedule.  One of them even took on a chickadee and later a robin, who of course had no interest in his sugar-water but I guess got a little too close for his liking.  Amazing how agressive they are for such pipsqueaks!

Over the week by the church and on the Hastings Heritage Trail I also saw:
Great Crested Flycatcher, Eastern Kingbird, Rose-Breasted Grosbeak, American Bittern, Yellow-Bellied Sapsucker, Pileated Woodpecker, Black-Backed Woodpecker (a first for me!), White and Red breasted nuthatches, Wild Turkey, Chestnut Sided, Black Throated Green and Magnolia Warblers, Ovenbirds, and common Yellowthroat (boy, does he ever say "witchity-witchity" - honestly, one of the only bird songs that sounds just like it's transcribed!).

It jarred me a bit how much harder "country" birding is compared to "city" birding.  In the park if someone mysterious is singing in the other side of the bush, you just walk around to the other side of the bush.  In the woods this is not always possible - I heard so many birds I couldn't ID, I think it probably would have doubled my list for the week.

Also had a bit of a run-in with a bear on the Heritage Trail.  But I used the VOICE OF GOD (or James Earl Jones) on him and told him "BEAR - GO BACK TO THE WOODS." And he did.  

I remain uneaten, to the consternation of many.

Julia