We have robins pop up here throughout the winter as well. Just the other day there must have been 100 robins in my small yard pecking around my composters and on a clear (not snow-covered) stretch of soil under my holly. I posted a picture on my blog, but it was tough to get a good picture from inside. It was an amazing site seeing them all in one place. The same thing happened last year as well. I placed out extra plastic plant saucers for them to use as birdbaths. I had to keep changing the water to keep it clean. It seemed as though they really needed a good clean drink of water and a bath. Even though I have feeders out, they seem to like looking for worms in the bare gardens and around the composter the most. Here is a link that might be useful: Robins in Kim's Garden

Thats funny, Charlene, because I didnt sleep very well last night eitherand I dont know why! I bet your sons being sick was keeping you awake more than gardening this time. I hope he starts to feel better real soon. The worm farm just happened! I discovered it late last summer when checking to see if any of the compost on the bottom of the pile was "done enough" to use. When I started digging in, I was finding worms by the handfuls, so I started transplanting a few along with each plant whenever I was planting anything. The soil, when I moved in here, had been completely unworked, and was buried under landscape fabric and rocks, so it was totally compacted, and virtually without worms. Little, by little, by little its getting betterbut it still has a ways to go. But it IS better than it used to be! My compost pile is built directly on the soil, so thats how the "worm farm" got started! Apparently when I started piling stuff on top of the soil, the worms decided that life in my "stuff" was easier than life in the hard-packed clay, and they seem to have eagerly moved in. I dont know anything at all about earthwormsexcept that theyre VERY goodbut somebody on another thread some time ago was talking about red-something worms, and I think that might be what I have! They sure look red to me! And there are some whiter looking ones that seem to be bigger. As a matter of fact, Ive run into a couple that look like they might be the Mother-of-all-Worms! But I found them when I was turning over the veggie garden. (I found one dead worm in the compost pile, and considered giving it mouth-to-mouth, but I wasnt sure which end to blow into, so........) My compost pile is not a "regulation" compost pile, though. I just throw everything on top, and, when it looks "done," I pull it out from the bottom and use it. I dont think you could grow worms in a "real" compost pile, because if they heat up enough to kill insects and weed seeds, I assume youd just wind up with a whole bunch of cooked worms! (Faux spaghetti?) (When I was a kidlittle kidone year after a heavy rain there was a couple feet of standing water in front of my uncles greenhouse, and some friends and I got some flower pots that we filled up with all the dead worms floating around in the waterin which we were wadingand pretended they were spaghetti! No! We didnt actually eat them! LOL) Anyway, if you havent already started your compost pile, when you do, dont put any kind of a barrier between it and the soil and youll probably wind up with your own worm farm. Or, you could even "seed" is with worms you find around the yard. Just "plant" them on the bottom of the pile right on top of the soil. I dont see why it wouldnt work for everyone, and, as I see it now, Im getting more benefit out of the worms than I am out of the compost. On the vole front, I dont know how much snow you got in Utah this year, bp, but there have been a few stories on the news here in Denver about the voles going crazy in their undisturbed Eden under all the snow, and apparently they did a LOT of damage to lawns and gardens. I bet, along with Charlene, that voles are what you have "happening." But Im not sure chicken wire is going to help keep them out, Charlene. Theyre the same size as regular mice, and, like regular mice, can get thru unbelievably tiny places. I found this site with pretty good information. Scroll down to the Exclusion section for more information. (You should like this site! Its from UC!) And, highalt, check out the Whos Here thread again. You finally have a western slope gardening neighbor. And, if you havent seen it yet, I made some veggie garden beautification suggestions over there too. Charlene, Im full of enthusiasm right now because I can be! My elbow surgery seems to have worked, so I can actually do things again, and Im still off for probably 4 more weeks, so I actually have time to be "enthusiastic!" When I go back to work, you wont be seeing too much of me around here. Ill be spending most of my time at home trying to catch up on my sleep againand desperately trying to keep up with the yard work when I AM awake. But for nowfull speed ahead! Happy spring, Skybird

Okay, I made everything ready, chased sparrows, trapped sparrows, and all was quiet in the yard. I saw one bluebird scouting out the area a day or two ago, no nest has been started. This morning from my window, I observe something I have not seen before-- a blue chasing a robin, and the robin coming back pretty aggressively. Is this common? Anthing to do about it? I have 2 sources of water, no feeders. Just curious.

IN the groups of birds, there were some that were similar to the Robins, dark gray, yellow beak and eye, but clearly no reddish orange breast coloring. They quickly moved away from my yard (still covered with a lot of snow and water) to another farther down that had more open grass and soil. The Northern Mockingbirds are too light gray, and I didn't see any white whits markings, though I could have easily missed them due to the distance. The Cedar Waxwings are a wishful possibility, but again, the birds I saw were of a uniformly dark color. Also, there are no berries around here. They were all gobbled up quickly in fall, and any drupes left on some trees were chased down by the squirrels on their high-wire act. The squirrels even go into my yews and eat all the little red berries. The birds I saw were clearly pecking and digging in the ground to find food. Today is colder and windy, and there aren't as many birds around