"That Damn Bird!"

Cardinal

Though beautiful, cardinals can be extremely vain!

Recently, at the end the day, I noticed a departing greenhouse worker remove a plastic nursery pot from each  rear view mirror and stow them in his tool box.  Old memories awakened as I asked him what was up with his mirrors. “That damn bird!” was his answer, and I knew a red bird had found his truck.

For as long as our greenhouses have been here, people working there have parked outside. And just as long, cardinals have found themselves irresistible in our rear view mirrors. Or maybe they see a rival that s equally matched? Whatever they see, it causes them to stay a long time and return frequently. And while they are looking deeply into the mirror, they are also digesting and leaving their droppings in large quantities. The mess is even worse when car windows are left down, then the inside is fouled too.

To keep our vehicles clean, we have to hide our mirrors from narcissistic birds!

Over the years, employees have tried various methods for stopping the cardinals from soiling their cars. Socks, hats, and various other items have been selected. But the best I have seen yet is an old nursery pot. We do try and cooperate with nature, but do not feel we need to share our vehicles with the birds.

Planting Time

Last fall when I first began this gardening blog, I reported on my seed collecting endeavors. Seed collecting is just the first step towards growing plants. All those ziplock bags full of seeds were carefully stored over the winter.

And now we are at the next step, which is to plant the seeds. I had collected seeds from various flowering annuals, some perennials, and a few herb plants. The goal is to plant wildflowers in all the conservation grasslands around the farm. Annual plants such as cosmos and Gomphrena will give color this year as the perennial natives establish themselves. To create a blooming prairie effect Dames Rocket and Shasta Daisies start blooming in spring and are followed by Coreopsis, Rudbeckia, Ratibida, and Echinacea in summer. A total of thirty types of flowers were planted

This year I am planting what I call “the grand finale”. Summer into fall will find Helianthus full of yellow sunflowers intermixed with the blue haze of wild Ageratum. I will have to wait until the following fall to see how it works, perennials must have time to establish. But for now we must wait and have faith that planting these seeds in the cold ground will sprout and grow in spring.

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Our BIG Feathered Friends

Eagles live on the James River all around us here and we see them often from the nursery. They are beginning to get busy, as spring is not too far away. Pairs are together defending territory and building giant stick nests. As a parent of teenagers and young adults, I understand the pair’s conflicted feelings as they drive grown offspring from the nest. And I totally do not understand how, having raised one brood, they steadfastly set about raising another.

The eagle nest on our property has produced young for many years, I personally have seen nine eagles in sight at one time. It wasn’t too many years ago there were no breeding eagles here, having been decimated by DDT and locally Keypone, which was allowed to drain into the river. The eagles is proof of Nature’s ability to heal and repair old damage. We love watching all the bird life on the river; eagles are our favorites.

Want to learn more about how eagles are bouncing back from the brink of extinction? Check out this great documentary from PBS’s Nature: American Eagle.

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Briscoe releasing an eagle that was tagged by biologists from the College of William & Mary last winter.