Those berries must be good!
Sally, I just realized my comments on that article might not have come out the way I intended.
The article was just so sad that I couldn't bear to look at videos of what it described.
Feeding feathered and furry friends
Nifty, ssg!
S'ok Muddy, I wasn't upset. I actually didn't read in depth till just now. Bad, bad birds.
Two mice and I were mutually startled when I started to take a seed tray from my little vinyl greenhouse this weekend. They had made a nest in between it and another tray I had thrown on top.
There weren't any babies, so I took that tray, swapped it for another one, put their nest on the new one and put it in the greenhouse.
As far as places to nest go, they couldn't have made a better choice. It's sheltered from the elements and predators (and not in my house!), and there's a steady supply of food!
Muddy--
What kind of bird were they? Maybe I missed an earlier post on this?
G.
Not birds - mice....who made a cozy bed on top of the dirt in a seed tray I was removing for winter-sowing.
I often find remnants of mice nests in between stacked clay pots in my shed.
You know what is FUNNY? I have not seen ONE Chipmunk this year!
A few years back--they were all over my patio gathering Sunflower Seeds
in their stuffed cheeks. Most of them lived under the concrete steps
under my front-of-the-house entrance.
Has anyone else noticed this???? I kind of miss them....Cute!
g.
haha Muddy!
I never see chipmunks anyway.
Stocked up on safflower, 20 lb for 27 dollars at feed store in Gambrills. And a four pound bag of 'mostly millet' since they had no 'just millet'. Wouldn't you know, squirrel is already back investigating the feeder cuz there is sunflower in there.
Sally--
I buy bags of Millet (7lbs) at Big Lots. $7. Mostly for the ground feeders...
Doves...
It has a sprinkling of other seeds in it too-but not much..
They have all kinds of bagged seeds...cracked Corn- etc.
Checl it out--IF you have a Big Lots nearby. I like the one on Merrit Blvd. best.
It has all kinds of garden stuff--and a good sale end of the season.
G.
growing up in the country each late fall field mice would take up residence in the house where our mouser dog and cat would make short work of them. after the dog died of old age, the cat had to do it all, for at least three years the cat would dispatch all ofthe mice except for the last one and they played 'cat and mouse games' late at night until the spring. field mice are already so wide eyed. glad you left the nest. interesting what fluffies their nests incorporate. can say that natural fiber clothes can be on their gotta have lists. we always considered field mice much cleaner than the dark grey house mice we would get occasionally not sure why
I just saw a hawk swoop out of the yard. Not sure if he got anything as I just looked up as he was leaving heading away. I always think that hawks need to eat, too. But why can't he pick up mice from the nearby fields instead of staking out my feeders.
Drive-thru vs fixing dinner.
thanks Gita, yes I have a Big Lots very close by
coleup- reminds me of The Country Mouse and the City Mouse.
Holly- agreed
Saw lots of flocks of Robins out on my route yesterday: cleaning up after all the various leaf removal companies with their teams of blowers cleared leaves from yards into the streets awaiting large vacuum truck pick up. Worms still at surface of soil. Feast on!
well Spring is just around the corner after all . 13 weeks or so
; ^)
I know we have mice in our unfinished basement. I put humane "Mice Cubes" traps down there now and then, not consistently because it's a pain having to check every day to see if there's a mouse inside them.
I'm with you on the hawks as well, Holly. It's like a canned hunt when they go after birds at bird feeders.
Speaking of a house mouse: My youngest daughter took this photo of a mouse peering through a door frame in her apartment.
Oh that is so cute, but I am not sure how happy she is about it. LOL
She also thought it was cute; she has had pet mice for years. She's tried to block off mice entry points, but she lives in a ground floor apartment backing up onto woods, so there's no keeping them all out. Snakes also come into her apartment, maybe because of the mice, but fortunately for them she thinks they're cute too!
Oh, a ring necked snake, he's cute! I kept one once for a few days, and it shed skin in the tank. Maybe it was easy to catch because it was ready to shed. Anyway, I think somewhere I still have that prefect little shed skin.
Aww...that mouse in the door frame is so adorable! I didn't know there was a humane mouse trap, that's great to hear. I had to use a kill trap in the garage a few years back and I felt really bad about it. The little guy just wasn't large enough to trip the smallest Have-A-Heart trap.
She had a black snake in her apartment once. One of her cats found it and it scared the cat so much that she jumped 2 feet in the air!
Sequoia, I use Mice Cubes: http://www.amazon.com/Mice-Cube-Pk-Reusable-Humane/dp/B000WB13QC
I actually caught a mouse just last night, and released it into the woods this morning.
Oh wow!! That's awesome, I never knew about those before. Next time there's a mouse issue, I'll get one of those. Thanks.
There are a number of "catch 'em alive" mouse traps. I once lived in a cabin in the woods and had lots of deer mice. I would catch them and keep them in a 20 gallon fish tank, periodically taking them out to play with. Invariably, they would get away from me and be re-caught. I could actually tell them apart by the personality/behavior traits they exhibited.
One young mouse loved the wheel I had put in the tank, running continuously for hours at a time. If I opened the cover, all the other mice would scurry to hide in a small "house" in the corner, but this little guy would just keep running. I'd reach in at one side of the wheel and he would shift to the far side, not missing a step. If I reached from both sides, he would jump off, run around until I moved my hands, then jump back on the wheel.
The exercise wheel was all metal, with metal axle supported by holes in sheet metal. It didn't really make noticeable noise when a single mouse was on it, but sometimes everyone present wanted to participate. Imagine 7 mice of varying sizes all on the wheel together, some running to turn it, others simply clinging on for the ride. With that much of a load the wheel made a loud, endless squeaking. Unfortunately, deer mice are nocturnal, and the tank was upstairs in my bedroom. One night about 2 AM I had enough. I opened the window, grabbed the wheel and shook it outside. Seven mice went flying into the night.
Next day, one of my traps had caught a mouse. When I shook out the mouse into the tank, the young mouse bounced once on the shavings and onto the wheel and began running. Didn't know that small animals could exhibit such obsessiveness.
what a tale!
Lol....you should have called him Forrest
Greenthumb, you're full of surprises!
I have to admit that my daughter's mouse, Stuart, is pretty cute. He ends up getting too many treats when I have to take care of him.
We kept one of the mice we caught for awhile because it was too cold to put it outside. I have spare mouse and hamster cages in the basement, but I don't want to clean them, so I'll put the traps away soon and pretend I don't have mice in the basement : -)
I don't know if I mentioned this before but there's been a rabbit living under our Larch. Normally I hate rabbits but it's kind of neat having a little 'pet' around the yard while I'm working. I left an apple out for it the other day.
Sweet! I don't know much about wild rabbits...does it live in a hole under the tree?
No, it lives in a little burrow. It pushed the soil around so that it's like a little nest.
You'll have to get a photo of it sometime - and of the burrow; I'd like to see what one looks like.
I don't think we have many rabbits around here; there are lots of foxes.
Jeff--
Last summer (2013) I had a very prolific mama rabbit. She had 5 clutches (??).
I could tell by all the different sized baby rabbits running around.
They ARE cure--BUT---they grow up and have more rabbits...
Because of rabbits--i have to encircle most of my beds in plastic, green fencing.
UGH! Hate the look! They will chew leaves off the stems on Oriental lilies--
as far up as they can reach. Then--they chew down the whole stem and leave it laying there.
They snip off all the new growth from all kinds of plants! Hate it!
This spring--there was just one ADULT rabbit around. I really never saw it.
She must have had one "clutch"--as there was one juvenile always hiding in my beds.
It grew bigger---but not quite adult size. NO others were seen.
I believe this Mama rabbit was nesting under the raised foundation (sitting on 6"x6" PT logs)
and I think that. also, there may have been a black snake living under there.
I never saw any babies running around! GOOD!
Perhaps next year there will NOT be any rabbits at all. I can dream!
Here is the sole survivor. He/she was very shy and always hiding in the backs
of my beds amid all the foliage. I don't think this rabbit are any of my plants.
it was always, happily, munching of clover in my lawn. Kind of...tame.
Yeah, I'm not a big fan of rabbits either G. I do have some tools for combat that don't involve fences during the growing season. Milorganite definitely keeps them away. There is a good thing to having a rabbit live in the yard though because hopefully it is a female and it will come back and have babies in my yard. This way, I'll keep an eye on them and steal them just before they leave the nest to relocate them elsewhere. I did that with a nest earlier this past season. There were 5 but one got away before I raided the nest.
It sounds like this rabbit isn't afraid of you. Does it have a name yet?
Lol....no name yet. It will run from me if I get too close. It's funny though because I'll be working out in the yard for a while and not even notice it's there. I think it feels pretty safe under the branches of our Larch.
jeff--
Someone near here (a friend) had a Larch tree (Tamarack) in her yard.
Very "out of place"--as they prefer cooler areas...a more Northern climate.
It was huge--maybe 50'+ tall. and quite wide.
I loved the flat pine cones it had and the long, soft needles.
Nice to make swags out of.
http://www.2020site.org/trees/larch.html
G.
Nice site Gita. Thanks
Yeah there are quite a few pretty ones around here. Ours is a very strong grower. I haven't trimmed any branches off it and it's branched to the ground. I think I'm going to leave it that way for a few more years and then I might limb it up but no more than a foot off the ground. We'll see. I think that's why the rabbit likes it so much.
how us a picture of your larch, Jeff....G.
Here's a link G:
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/fp.php?pid=9972587
Very nice looking.