Nearing the End

Saturday, as we near the end of 2006 the back yard was relatively quite. Only the squirrels were busy and one in particular may have had its clock twisted by the warm weather, or maybe it knows something about the cold and snow which will be coming in 2007. Anyway this particular squirrel spent the afternoon climbing up and down the tree finding just the right size branches to reinforce the its nest. I was able to get several pictures and hopefully you will be able to see him/her in action either gnawing on the limbs (twigs) or carrying them back to the nest.

The other squirrels were feeding at the base of the bird feeder or doing acrobats to get the corn off of the corn wind mill. Occasionally they would drop over to the bird bath for a drink, but none of them were concerned about rebuilding the nest. My wife would say that it was a female doing the work while the males fed them selfs. I don't know how to tell a female squirrel from a male squirrel from this distance and don't think I want to get close enough to tell anyway.

Hope everyone enjoys the pictures.

Industrious Squirrel Must be the female!






This must be a male waiting to be served at the table.

Back home today

Not much to report today. Squirrels are out and about and a Nuthatch made an appearance at the bird feeder. See these below.

Wednesday's trip to Banner March and other points

Wednesday we drove up to the Flanigan area to see if we could see a Snowy Owl, well no luck so we drove thru the country to just North of ElPaso and then headed into ElPaso for route 24 West. It was a cloudy day that had promised to be somewhat sunny but only reached the partial sunny stage for a few minutes. Sight seeing as we drove we went through Eureka to the bypass around Peoria and then South on 24 through Bartonville, Mapleton and Kingston Mines to Banner, the town. Supposedly Eagles had been spotted in this area. We did see a couple of birds high up in the air, around Kingston Mines but couldn't tell if they were hawks or Eagles.

At Banner we drove out the dyke road which parellels the Slough from Copperas Creek to Rice Lake and the Illinois River. The drive was pretty but would have been better had the sun been out. While we heard a few birds we mostly saw hawks perched in the trees. I would like to go back on a nicer day maybe next Spring. I have posted a few pictures of the trip below.

Christmas Day a time for family

Today I am copying a portion of a letter dated July 26, 1982 written by my Uncle Paul to my son Andrew. Family might find this interesting as we the first Christmas since Uncle Paul's passing.

Dear Andrew,

Today we received the letter and picture of Peter both of which we were happy to receive. I have been planning to write to you for some time and have often composed letters in my mind but have never got to the typewriter - typewriter because you would have almost as hard a time reading my handwriting as your father did that of my father. As time permits I would like to share with you some of the stories about our family and in the event that I never get to put them down elsewhere on paper, you might like to file these away for future reference. I myself keep a file of all letters I receive and have been asked to make provision for them to be turned over to the Indiana Historical Society or at least for copying. Over the years I have had correspondence with many of our relatives regarding past history of the family. This was the reason Fred Griffin the county historian for Harrison County, Indiana asked me to make such arrangements. I hope you will find them interesting and some times informative- I have been told that mnay people do. I like to think that this is an inherited attribute from my great great grandfather Aaron Patrick McKim. I am only sorry that his letters have disappeared. He went off to the Civil War-on the North side and died in Columbia, Kentucky from measles. During this time he wrote to his wife and I have been told that m;y great great aunts and uncle use to pour over these on rainy days. You see after he died Grandma Mary Jane Smith McKim married again and had ten additional children so letters could be anywhere, but I think that they crumbled apart from age and lack of care. Grandfather Aaron's son our Grandfather James I McKim was my mother's grandfather. Mom always thought that there was no one so important as her grandfather McKim. I remember as a childhow his letters would always bring joy into our household and each one usually had a poem. Grandpa had several of these published in the local newspaper. He was a Republican, but the poems were published in the Corydon Democrat because it was one with more circulation and actually it still is published whereas the Corydon Republican no longer exists. I only saw Grandpa McKim once when I was ten, but he has had a far greater influence on me than any other family member. He died the year your Aunt Patricia was born and he so wanted to see her for she was she was his first great great granddaughter. When he visited us he took my sister and me to see a Shakespearean play and since then Shakespeare has always been one of my favorites. Don't expect my letters to be properly organized, because I do better when I rattle on and on.

Saturdays trip to Lexington included these photos:

My Great Grandfather William Henry Shickel Lexington Pleasant Hills



My mother Alice P Shickle Bloomington EastLawn



My Aunt Leora Zelma Maude Shickle Bloomington East Lawn



My Uncle Paul Eugene Shickle Bloomington East Lawn



My great grandfather had two families. The first wife provided my grandfather and sibelings and later he married Minerva Brown and this is the family plot of the second group of children located in Pleasant Hills Lexington, IL.

Christmas Eve

I haven't posted for several days because of the heavy pre holiday activities at work and around the house. I did buy a few gifts this year, wasn't going to but I made a noon hour trip the day my wife told me not to show up for lunch as the girls were coming for brunch that day.

Yesterday my son Andrew came over to help move a new futon down to the basement so that the youngest son will have a place to sleep if he makes it home Christmas Day. He starts out at 6:41am in sunny Southern California flys to San Fransico, home of the reocurring earthquakes, on to O'hara and then to the Central Illinois Regional Airport. We decided that if the futon leaves the basement neither of us were going to carry it out in one piece! Going down the stairs it could slide it will not slide up the steps.

Below are a few pictures from Saturday. It appears the hawk may have left the area as the song birds are slowly returning. Yesterday I spotted a Nuthatch, couple of Northern Cardinals, plent of Doves, a Carolina Wren and even a Gold Finch. Today these were all back and even our Red Belly Wood Pecker has made it presence known. Maybe filing the bird feeder and putting suet plugs out have encouraged the birds back, but the hawk certainly kept many of the song birds away.

I drove up to Flanigan Illinois yesterday afternoon, listened to Christmas Music, until I had my fill while driving, I had seen reports of the spotting of a Snowy Owl, but failed to spot the creature. I did see a couple of beatiful hawks, but none would stay put long enough for me to take their picture. The fields were very wet with water standing in all of the low places and at least one river was flooded in various places.

Pictures below are of the NutHatch, Carolina Wren and a few ducks on a pond near Lake Bloomington.

A Cloudy Day

Sunday afternoon is probably better for sleeping, but after watching the Bears on television I decided it was time to watch a little of nature. Went over to White Oak Lake and caught a few Mallards and Canadian Geese swimming. It was a bit nippy with the wind and no sun. Then headed off to Comlara Park. I found the deers in their normal spot and all four of them headed off into the woods as I approached. Did get a couple of pictures as the tree are barren and therefore the deers can't hide very well.

Below is one of our back yard squirrels that loves to pose to get his picture taken. I did oblige him and he is cute.

What's that up in the tree?

Birding has been rather slow the past two weeks and I was wondering what I had done to scare the birds away from our feeders. Today I may have discovered the reason. As I turned to look out my view window a rather large bird flew into the tree in our back yard. Normally my camera is right here and all I have to do is grab it and turn it on. Not today, quickly I got up and hustled to the dining room to retrieve the camera and on my way back turned the camera on and stopped at the kitchen window to aim the camera at what we now believe to be a Cooper's Hawk. I took one quick shot and aimed to take another shot and he started into flight once again. The two picters are rather poor quality, but they do prove that our Normal Back Yard had a hawk visit.

Talking to Birds Unlimited later today we learned that indeed a Cooper's Hawk would cause fear in smaller birds and maybe even cause them to look elsewhere for food until they felt safer. I know that I have spotted a hawk in our yard at least twice before today. The first time was in late September as one landed on our fire place chimney and flew off before I could take his picture. Then last Saturday on flew into the same tree out back. That time I had the camera ready but when I turned to find the camera he flew off.

One of the members of the Central Illinois Birding Forum has a blog web site and she has neat pictures of Bald Eagles which nest near the Illinois river. Her blog can be found at: http://walkwithmepart2.blogspot.com/