Thursday, January 13, 2022

Birds

 I went to the park today.  Yeah, it was raining.

Speaking of rain, Astoria, up on the northern Oregon coast, has already gotten a foot of rain this January so far.  12 inches of rain!   

So anyhow, I go to the park between cat food deliveries.  I had first taken two bags to the bad cottages folks.  He's in an RV now, since the mold problem got the landlord in trouble with the city.  Or something.  One unit had already burned, even though empty.   So the landlord put the guy up in an RV til the cottages are rebuilt, which is good. They're going up fast. He's going to get into one of the new one's so he's very excited over it.  Old guy and is still feeding the handful of cats left there.   

Then I went to the park before taking two more bags up to the Sweet Home quarry folks.  They were not there, so I tucked the bags under the front of their trailer, best I could to stay dry til they got home.  Only one cat showed up when I cracked open some wet food.

I found a case of Nine Lives wet food I gave them over a month ago.  None had been used, and put it back in my car.  The cardboard it was in was by now soggy wet.  What a waste that would have been.  They are large cans.   

Between those two deliveries I went to the park.   Most of the flooding is gone now.   Up and down goes the river in the winter.  The ground is ever soggy, however.   Everywhere damp, sponge feel to the ground beneath feet.   Drip, drip, drip.  Rain forest style.

Here's what looks like the next dead to ground tree.  Shall I take bets on when it falls?

There are lots like it.  This one is just in plain sight is all.


The downed tree by the boat ramp is still laid out.   The birds filled its broken grounded limbs, in happy flocks today, pecking maybe at the bugs making an exit from the torn apart trunks.  Many of the birds were towhee's.  There are many towhee's at the park year round.  I have always called them Rufous sided towhees  but now I see they've changed the name to Spotted Towhee.  








Sparrows and Oregon Juncos (now renamed Dark Eyed Juncos) completed the entourage.   What a party!  They were chrping, digging out bugs, chasing each other and seemed to be totally happy.





Oregon a mess in Covid cases right now.  People are dealing with it.  I have zero expectations anymore.  Stores have empty shelves so I take what I can get.  What's there is terribly expensive.  $5 for a gallon of generic clorox for instance.   Before the pandemic It was maybe $2, if that.   Going to be a lot of people losing weight over the rise in food prices.

You can't find a place to get a covid test either.  Except I hear the Casino, near the coast, will have them there.  That's a big business draw for them.   Good for them!  The news tonight warned the 8000 or so cases the state is counting now daily won't happen long because there's no more tests.   Great.  We can pretend Covid has vanished.

The birds are oblivious, best way to be, me thinks.





12 comments:

  1. Astoria reminds me of poppy eye town. My hubby and I tour a museum that had all sorts of boats and such.
    Coffee is on and stay safe

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    1. Oh, the maritime museum. The vet clinic I love is in Astoria. I do love it there.

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  2. Love the birds and am very glad that you were able to reclaim that wet food. It is much better with you where it will be used.
    Tests are in short supply here too. Omicron is thriving - as best we can tell in the absence of testing facilities. I shudder to think what the number would look like if we COULD get tested.

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    1. Sometimes its best not to know, or at least to test those who come to the ER sick or get hospitalized.

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  3. Love the bird pictures. I don't see as many birds at this house as I did at the last one and I miss the variety. Junco's come here in the winter and I saw my first one the other day.

    I saw my first bit of empty shelves yesterday. Much of the produce and meat shelves were empty. However, we were able to get most of what we needed. We are getting more snow on Sunday so that will probably empty them more.

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    1. It's been tough to find cat food lately, enough for the hordes here plus the folks I supply, through the nonprofit. Some days the stores seem fully stocked though.

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  4. I wonder why they let that food sit there like that. ~scratches head~ People baffle me. Birds, not so much. :D These are beautiful! Thank you for sharing. Take care, my dear. I hope you stay safe, sane, and supplied.

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    1. They had used the small cans I'd given them, but only would open the can and let the cat eat out of the can, which drives me nuts, because they can cut their tongues doing that besides it being hard to eat food from a can. They would have had to use a spoon to get the wet food out of the larger cans and put the food on a plate, something that was likely far too much effort from people who generally open a bag of dry and sit it outside and let the cats eat from the bag. No effort into anything sort of people.

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  5. At least the birds enjoyed the dead trees. If you want to send any of that rain my way, we'll take it. Oh, we'll complain about it, but we can sure use it.

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    1. Where do you live, Liz, that you need our rain? Wouldn't it be nice if rain, like with flash flooding or tropical storms, could quickly collect in huge tubes, maybe like giant waterslide tubes, and then vacuum sucked (like Jetson style) to where it was needed most. I can see it now, in my mind, the engineers manning switching points, "No, you idiot, hit that switch, not that one! Its headed to eastern Colorado this time, not Oregon. THEY HAVE PLENTY! You know how much trouble we'd be in if we sent this batch to Oregon?"

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  6. It's so nice that you take food out there for the cats. Cat food shelves here are always just about empty lately and what they do have is so expensive, but like you said the prices of everything is outrageous right now! Beautiful shots of the birds. Thanks so much for stopping by to visit me. Have a nice weekend and stay safe out there!

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    1. I've been watching the park cats six years now. I've trapped probably 200 or so in the park, to be fixed. Most got homes. There are only three true park cats left, that is until a homeless camper left hers behind and now I need to catch him, at least to be fixed. It's been over six months he's been on his own so he's likely turned wild by now. Prices are crazy and scary!!!!

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