The News from Kenabeek

Another blue and gold day … After several weeks of relentlessly rainy weather, the past few days have been glorious, Indian summer weather. The poplars and birches still retain most of their leaves, bright gold against the blue sky. And this afternoon while I was hanging laundry on the line, I heard a multitude of little voices chittering, and turned in time to see a huge flock of blackbirds threading their way through the trees on their way south. There must have been hundreds of them, all chattering away to each other as they flew. Blue and gold and black. Lovely.

As for the first sign of winter — the other day a chickadee landed on the balcony railing and took a good look around. Obviously, he was looking for the feeder, to ensure everything is in place for the winter! Since the big sunflower seed feeder is not up yet (and won’t be until the bears have gone to bed), he flew up onto the little feeder and had a couple of tentative pecks. Fruitlessly, I’m afraid – that feeder is designed for the little finches, which are comfortable hanging upside down, and the chickadees, so far, have not figured out that the holes are under the perches, not above. Although we did have one genius junco last year, which figured it out, but just couldn’t stay hanging down, and kept rotating on the perch!