Obsessed with the birds

I have truly been taken with birds in the last year.  I've always appreciated birds and would stop to admire one in my sight, but it's now different.  Working at Lewis Ginter has definitely played a large role in this - especially because I've had the opportunity to see birds that I don't usually come across in my yard or the places that I frequent on the weekends.  I can distinctly remember each of these birds, where I sighted it, and what the weather was like outside.   

The first close encounter with a green heron happened to be a day I was sitting outside at work lamenting the loss of my friend Ronnie.  I was crying and unable to work and took a break near the pond where the lotus was tall and blooming.  I heard a sound in the lotus and looked up to see a green heron looking at me from just a few feet away.  We looked at each other for a few minutes but it felt like an hour and she then turned around and continued to wade through the pond looking for fish.  I was exhilarated and refreshed.  The experience was special and remarkable.  It was almost exactly a year ago to this day and marked the beginning of a connection with birds.

The next remarkable encounter was at this same pond a few months later.  I was taking a group of toddlers around the Children's Garden in search of animals and their homes.  We noticed a great blue heron close to the pond edge about twenty feet away and I asked the kids to stop and not speak.  We watched him wading in the water and right in front of us, quicker than a second, he speared a fish and swallowed it down.  It was an experience that most people never have and I was able to share it with a group of kids who were completely in awe.  

Since then I've been greatly impressed with seeing bright red Scarlet Tanagers eating berries in the Mulberry tree, the yellow and black American Goldfinch eating seeds from the coneflowers, and the hairy and downy Woodpeckers eating the suet in the winter.  I became obsessed with Cedar Waxwings and could not spot one at work despite other folks seeing them eating holly berries around the garden.  Finally my friend Allison found THE spot that they were all visiting.  We went with binoculars and watched for about 20 minutes as they flew to the large holly tree to get a berry, fly to another adjacent tree to eat it, and fly back to the holly again.  I didn't get as close of a look as I wanted but was satisfied.  Another thing I realized this day is that spotting birds alone has a very different feel than watching them with other people.

By far, the most amazing experience was the Red Tailed Hawk.  I've already made a personal connection with these beautiful birds of prey.  While driving to Asheville, NC for Ronnie's wake, I constantly noticed hawks flying above from south Richmond to Asheville.  The next day, as I was sadly leaving Asheville in my car, I was on the phone with my friend Tim telling him about the birds and I looked up and saw one fly right overhead.  I was beginning to acknowledge that this was not a coincidence.  Again, there they were flying overhead during my drive back to Richmond.  This immediately inspired my memorial tattoo to Ronnie, a large red-tailed hawk with two words that had been tattooed on Ronnie's arms- evolve and revolt.  So last month, I was leaving work as the sun was going down and I was feeling a little down myself.  As I was walking past the mulberry tree, before I could process the flash in front of me, I heard the loud sound of the metal fence shake.  I stop in the middle of my stride and try to catch my breath as my heart tries beating out of my chest.  Just a few feet in front of me is a red-tailed hawk perched on the fence staring at me.  I have never been this close to a wild bird of prey in my life and I was stunned.  The hawk did not seem phased but seemed to be studying me.  We stared at each other for about two minutes and I then I moved.  The hawk was slightly startled and flew up a few feet onto a branch of the mulberry.  The bird looked like a juvenile, not fully colored like an adult red tail and also not afraid.  I stood there for about five minutes just watching him look around until he flew off toward the pond.  I walked back to my car in a daze, doubting that it had really happened and my heart was still beating fast.  It started to sink in and I couldn't stop smiling the whole ride home.  

So, now I'm really obsessed with birds!

Garden lessons

Arrow started to really understand colors for the first time the summer after he turned 2 years old.  That July, a renegade cherry tomato plant popped up in a flower bed under a pine tree in the backyard.  Of coarse it was more prolific than our intentional tomato plants - Murphy's Law.  Arrow was so excited about picking and eating those perfectly-sized tomato fruits.  It took a while, but he eventually started to leave the green ones on the vine and learned to pick the yellow fruits for eating.  He experimented with the various tastes of the ripe fruit within the whole yellow spectrum and truly seemed to understand that the brightest, yellowest tomatoes were indeed the most flavorful.  

This year will be Arrow's fourth summer garden and although he may not be running around naked in the back yard anymore, he'll still be picking fresh fruits off the vine and telling Nick and I which ones are the best!