Busy Bird Feeder

The bird feeder is a busy place this morning. The chickadees have been joined by another species I can't locate in my bird book. It is larger than a chickadee with a slate grey/black back and a white breast. I think we called them snow birds when I lived in Cumberland.

A lone woodpecker has also come to feed today. I don't see him as often as the others. I guess he can still find insects in the trees most of the time, but the 35 centimetres of snow we received overnight may have covered his regular eating places.

Several jays are being almost polite but not quite as patient as they were yesterday when they whiled away their time waiting for the chckadees to finish feeding by flirting with one another.

Three black squirrels are eyeing things and one zipped along the line upside down to get to the feeder, but scampered back to a tree when I knocked on the window. Kenya, bossy as always, barked furiously at the interloper who had to be scolded by me. I've just let her out to maintain some semblance of order at the feeder. She lets the birds come without any concern although she sometimes seems to think the jays are big enough to be something other than birds.

I have been up since 6 getting garbage up the hill, checking the road, going for a toboggan ride, shoveling and doing laundry.

I suspect I will be shoveling at intervals for a few days. We have received one big dump of snow and I had to hunt for the steps to clear them. I hope I can find my car after being snowed one and then likely closed in by Leonard's plow.