Susan, I'm mostly seeing Sulphurs, which we have in great profusion here, and also a few Question Marks and Commas. I haven't seen any Red Admirals yet, but we had a billion of them last year so I'm sure I'll see some before too long. We have a small handful of native wildflowers blooming, and the orange tree was blooming for the last 2 or 3 weeks but it is finished now. We have had high temps in the upper 70s a couple of times lately, and all the little flying critters came out of the woodwork like crazy on those days. On the day we hit 78 degrees, red wasps were out. We have the most honey bees I've ever seen out and about in January, and I hope that is a sign that the honey bee population is healthy and abundant this year. Helen, If I forget and leave cat food on the porch after dark, we have a steady stream of visitors, including armadillos, possums and coons coming to eat it. I try to remember to bring in the food at night so we don't encourage these varmints to hang around close to the house. We just have too much wildlife here. Last night I stepped out onto the back porch to call the cat who had not yet come indoors for the night, and there were three deer standing about 15 or 20' from the porch. I think they were coming to the side yard to eat any bird seed that the birds had dropped from the bird feeder to the ground. All the wildlife here is so hungry and has a hard time finding food they like at this time of the year. We have a yard full of cottontail rabbits every night. I'm not sure if they're eating bird seed or maybe the winter rye grass. Dawn

Yes she did! It seems they stick around for several weeks/month until flock disperses for breeding,.. still lots of Crab Apples, Mountain Ash, High bush Cranberry, Chokecherries, Russian Olive etc. around, they might even pick off new buds on trees. Only had ones a nest in the backyard around 25 years ago in a little spruce trees about 4 foot up, now that tree is HUGE. Have never seen the Cedars here in winter, they soon will be returning and I will see usually several nest out on the hobby farm, [above pictures] planted several hundred spruce trees from seeds. Hardly ever see Bohemian nest,..I'll have to ask them where they go.

OH, I see what you mean. This must be more of a tech thing, using the camera to it's limits? They want to see every tip of every feather and give most of the credit to the camera? I just think that pic is a work of art, I think the "soft edges" enhances the beauty of the birds and the flowers. May I print it and hang it? I could send you a few very bad pictures of my little pond, never seem to be able to get the brids that love it so much to pose for me. Wax wings, Indigos, Tanagers, Orioles, Towhees, Cardinals, Gold Finches, Grosbeaks, Dees, Robins, all make a very colorful splash along with all the flowers blooming around it and the goldies IN it..

A couple of years ago, I had a pair of waxwings nesting in a tree in my yard. A robin kept approaching the nest. Even though the robin didn't do anything to the eggs, the waxwings ended up abandoning the nest with the eggs in it because, I guess, of the robin coming too close to the nest and disturbing them. Even though robins don't pose a threat, I guess they felt the nest wasn't safe. I think the robin liked the location of the nest. Anyway, they stayed away for quite some time. They eventually returned and dismantled the nest and moved it to another yard. I had provided wool for them to build the nest so they didn't want to leave the wool behind so they relocated. I was sad to see them leave, but the next year they successfully nested and had 5 fledglings that all successfully left the nest.