Pond is for the birds

 Happy New Year! I've been traveling and lounging, because that's what one is supposed to do during the holidays, so I don't have any exciting gardening updates. What I do have are birds. Lots and lots of birds. This is our first winter with our pond, and apparently the feathered population of Flagstaff has decided it's a giant birdbath. We have flocks of birds hanging out in our front yard, and every morning, they're in the pond, bathing and drinking and being generally hilarious. We love the entertainment, though our driveway is now festooned with a fine glaze of bird droppings. Ah, well: everything has a downside.

Another downside: it's hard to get decent pictures of our feathered visitors, because as soon as they see me come out the front door, they scatter. So I've started taking pictures of them through one of our living room windows. The only problem is, our living room windows are dirty. I haven't cleaned them properly in well over a year, because I'm lazy. So my bird pictures aren't as sharp and clear as they could be if I put down the camera and cleaned the damn windows. Ah, well. No one ever said this blog was operated by National Geographic.





All of the pictures above were taken yesterday morning. This one was taken in early November. We came back from a walk to find a roadrunner drinking from the pond. An honest-to-goodness road runner. No sign of a coyote or any packages from Acme, thank goodness. He fled at sight of us, but we were able to get a couple of pics thanks to a good zoom lens.



So far we're loving the pond. It's a bit of work, but it's kind of fun to have the local avian spa. I hope the birds hang around for grasshopper season. I need all the help I can get with those things.