Hi every one! Can you believe it? I still cannot believe my luck and I was there!!! Again while on my way to work this morning there was someone white and *quite* chunky looking flying across the road. I pulled over, backed up a bit, and admired a stunningly beautiful snowy Owl perched on top of a utility pole. This one was much larger than the first Owl I had seen and was more heavily barred. The barring seemed darker / black. I believe this Owl was a female as her face, nape of the neck and center of the breast were white. From what I was able to research that does describe the female snowy. Maybe this was an immature but I did not find much description of them. Any way ... I am 113% sure this was another Snowy Owl! What a wonderful start to the day! As my luck would have it, I did not have my camera in the car for the past week. Had the camera been there then for sure the Owl would NOT! LOL! So that was a great start to the day. I was 20 minutes late to work but work is just soooo over-rated. LOL! The rest of the day was downhill but who cares? I saw another Snowy Owl! The Owl was about 1 mile south of the earlier sighting on Rt. 83 in N. Ridgeville again. C3D and 2 Snowy sightings this year!

I keep thinking of all those ladies who like to wear bright sunny dresses for Easter Sunday. It's not going to be quite the same this year, even if it is going to warm up a bit (and rain) for the weekend. 27F out there this morning, and we're well past the average last freeze date and nearing the average last frost date (next Tuesday). And yet it's been such a mild winter overall; I know I didn't drop below 20F here the entire season. But spring marches on. Warm weather will get here eventually. I hope! The long term forecast suggests above normal temperatures for April, so I guess the NAO is heading back where it belongs.

Hi everyone ! Great thread ! we live next to a horse farm and we have a hay pasture in front of our front yard and woods behind us ... lots of critters here , esp the year round resident squirrels who wreak havoc wherever they go ...we have lots of birds year round , we feed them sunflower seeds and suet , cardinals, wrends, chickadees, titmouses, doves, blue jays , juncos, woodpeckers, sparrows, even bluebirds become spring residents in the nestboxes we have in the front yard and down by the garden ... they do their best to eat all the bugs they can find ... we had a wren build her nest on a shelf in our garage last year ... and we even have a pileated woodpecker that visits now and then ... and every so often we hear an owl hoot in the middle of the night , it always wakes us up ... so very cool to hear when they are so close to the house , especially when another owl hoots back in reply . We also have a hawk who hangs out just off our driveway , we think she is hunting for mice in the hay pasture . Of course we also have deer here year round but they seem to show up most often when the garden is close to harvest time ... they like to eat the green beans the day before I go down to pick them .We also have bats we see in the summer at dusk flying around hopefully eating as many mosquitoes as they can get . Last spring we had baby skunks in a den in the hay pasture , momma skunk met an untimely death in the road just past the hay pasture ... a rescue group came and picked up the babies ... they sure were cute . We also have raccoons who show up at night , we think they and the deer are responsible for raiding the birdfeeders on occasion . In the summer we have many butterflies on the butterfly bush and flowers and hummingbirds on their feeder . I can't remember what it is called , I did look it up when I first saw it on the butterfly bush, it looks like a mutant cross between a bumblebee and a hummingbird . I love to get up close and take pictures, they don't seem to mind me with my camera, even the bumblebees pose for me LOL , I like to go out in the evening and see them sleeping on the blossoms . The hummers love to perch up high on our swamp magnolia tree , in the redbud tree or atop the highest branch of one of the fir trees overlooking the front yard . Its fun to watch the male hummers fight off other hummers trying to feed . Never a lack of wildlife around here ;-) Iris PS Several years ago at the house we lived in before we moved here we had baby squirrels born in the tree in our front yard, it was so much fun to see them come down the tree and eat the birdseed and nuts we put out and run back up the tree when momma gave the its time to go home signal LOL ... I also had a fox run right past ( 1 ft away from me ) when I was in the backyard working in the flower bed.

To all posters: especially Jillmcm an vonyon, thank you so much for your input on this subject. I live in a wooded area. I love watching all the wildlife,- turkey, deer, and especially the birds, we have blue bird, martin and wren houses, and several bird baths. I have suet feeders, finch feeders, and a hopper feeders, along with several bird baths. I enjoy the birds so much, and spend many hours watching them. Then last summer a pair of phobees built a nest on a window sill on the second floor of our house. What a delight! They would swoop down and eat tons of insects. When I saw a hawk in a tree next to our house eyeing the baby phobees, it was too much, I went over the edge. I was obsessed with how to keep them out of our yard. All of the posts on this forum have been so helpful to putting things in balance. I am going to rethink my pattern of feeding the birds. Although the Phobees don't eat at bird feeders,they do use the bird baths, and the mere fact that there is a concentration of birds, attracted the hawks. By the way, the hawks nested in the woods next to us, and I heard the baby hawk calling after it's mother for food and say them hunting together, so I know they have to eat too. Thank you, again!