Hello Glenda. Regarding the nightcrawlers, the best and tastiest ones, I find, are always on the bottom. I need to clear out the crowd to get to these more choice morsels. Having an enjoyable game of worm-toss breaks up the monotony of not having to dodge cats or be on the look-out for hawks. We do have toys, like several lattice balls with a bell inside each one. After a good feed, and poop, Bub and I will have a few rounds with the bells or some of the gifts Olive gave us. The Red Robin Cross has ensured that I am getting cherries daily. The daily rations change but cherries and blueberries are always provided. Cherries, blueberries, strawberries, cactus fruit (YUMMY treat), raspberries, pear, apples, assortment of grape varieties, apricot, banana, plum, peaches, watermelon, honeydew melon. There has also been several offerings of the fruit from the Mountain Ash tree, crabapples and when available holly berries. Bean sprouts and alfalfa sprouts sometimes garnish the rations. The cooked pasta dishes are very welcome. (Did I say that?) It is a mix of pastas, cookd veggies and fruit that is also provided for Olive and the other captives. Krazy Korn I believe is the product. There is another warm cereal mix that Bub enjoys eating but I find it a pleasant foot warmer. The mealworms and wax worms seem to be of equal quality and one doesn't need to get to the ones on the bottom first. They are all delicious and placed in several ration bowls so we all get our fill without competition. Olive mentioned I was looking a little round a while ago but since I have been working out I have trimmed up a little and am looking good. She even whistled the other day when she saw me. She is quite the hen! I have told her a match between up would not work but she has her hopes. Gotta go and throw some worms out. The small human should be here soon. Thanks for your concern, Glenda. Are you with the Red Cross or the Red Robin Cross? Barry

Cathy... yup, our bird definitely seems to be using the post, but we don't know if it is pouncing on the 'dads from there of it is just returning to the post to munch on them. Could be both. I did a closer check after the first post and lo and behold...the thing has gotten so comfortable with this routine that it actually coughed up a pellet from the post this time. This is the first one I found at that location--I'd been quietly hoping for this since you can learn an awful lot from an owl pellet:)--and I got lots of surprises when I started poking around in that little goodie. Yes, lots of crawdad exoskeleton, but here's the big shocker: our bird is also eating quite a few beetles, possibly stag beetles by the look of the remains. I kept pulling out these mahogany colored wing coverlets and thinking, now wait a minute, crawdads don't have THOSE... And oddly enough, very few mammal bits. Must be better or at least easier pickings in that ditch!! Maybe I should set out some clarified butter and a twist of fresh lemon... I'm now pondering ways to get my motion camera mounted to that phone pedestal! Oh and Cathy, forgot to add...I guess owl feathers must shuck off fairly easily when they make a dive onto prey. Given the fact that there are so many out there on a regular basis, I'm thinking at least a few of this bird's attempts at food are staged at a higher location than the pedestal. But there definitely wouldn't be any need for shock and awe tactics if you are picking off crawdads lumbering about the dry ground.

Beautiful feather. It looks so nice and soft, like I can just lay down on it.

and people don't want to wade through all that. Gratifying that you enjoyed it. I never had seen an owl close up like that even in a zoo, saw one in my tree high up that had ticked off about 15 crows, no camera lens I had then or now that would reach that far, they have to come to me lol. It is truly those eyes. How I wanted to adopt it, but I knew that would be selfish and the animal control people could have made things extremely difficult for me if they got wind of it. My son said, "Mom, why don't you just take it in and feed it." I might have done that, but gambeled (wish they had a spell checker, I'm getting bad) that it would be better off in the wild. You have no idea of the anguish I felt when it got on that wire, worried that it would get on the hot one. But I knew that it was stronger to get up there which meant it must have been getting some nourishment. I had dreams of training my own owl, have a leather shield made for my arm for it to perch on like those falconers in the old books and movies had. Maybe in another life? I try not to entertain such thoughts, but sure would like to meet up with it again in a better world. I kept a little feather that stuck to my clothes so I know it belonged to that owl that I put in the envelope of little things I want buried with me, along with a clipping of my favorite cat's fur. Now that is silly, isn't it? A hanky I gave my grandmother when I was little, silly little things, I'm not through yet lol. Really, the only aid I gave it was keep it off the ground so a dog wouldn't get it or the neighbor kids get to fooling with it, tried to keep it quiet around here, but finally a few got wind of it and were quite fascinated. I also have two owl feathers I picked up in the yard and put them in a small pottery vase one of my children made in school. I like that. I'll finish my silly story. I'm sitting in the one a/c room, finally turned it on, it is sizzling hot and humid, and I hear a ruckus outside, open the window and see three kids in my apple tree going for the green apples. Can anyone relate? I told them to come down from the tree, it wasn't safe. So I go get my apple picker, went out in the heat, and got them each a green apple, one wanted two and bigger, of course. I told them they were sour. They only wanted them because they were hard to get to. They will be back when they think I'm not looking lol. I hate to be like that, but because of lawsuits and parents, I don't want kids getting hurt on my property even if I have insurance. Some people just go for as deep pockets as they can find . . .a different world out there.