Wishing for something amazing...

The new fig tree is loving this hot weather.

And if some critter doesn't eat the figs before they ripen, we should have a good crop this year. 

So far so good.

It's hot. The chickens are going around with their mouths open. This is when we need to be sure that there is plenty of water for them. The wild birds are sharing the birdbath and find shade during the hottest parts of the day in the trees and bushes nearby.
Carl caught a sparrow the other day.It was near the fence under some bushes. I think Carl was surprised to find that he had actually caught it. By the time I pried it from his mouth, it was dead. He was going to eat it. He was very unset that I took it away from him.

I had been trying to get some shots of our newest members of the community. We have a mother deer that comes to the watering container every evening. she has two babies that she is very protective of.
Usually, she comes down by herself and drinks... then at some point she lets the babies come down too.
But, the minute she sees me,  as if they have some sort of pre-arranged warning worked out between them, they disappear into the trees.
Mom always stands her ground and likes to give me "the look"...

As if to tell me that I need to keep my distance.
And then she slowly leaves too... 

And I get the tail end of her as she slowly walks away.

Well, a few days ago.... I went out to feed the chickens and close them up for the night. I looked down toward the driveway and there were the deer... all looking at me.
I returned to the house for my camera and when I came back outside, they were still there.
Miracle of miracles.
I finally got these photos of our cute, little spotted visitors.

They watched me... then they watched their mom.

Mom must have said something to them because, all of a sudden, they looked at each other.

One of them looked up the hill. The other kept staring at me.

Then one bolted up the hill and the other followed right behind
.

The response was orchestrated and without hesitation... and then they were gone.

But, I now have some images that I'm happy with.
They come back every evening to lean through fences and  reach into my garden. The pile of garden clippings has been rifled through by morning and the deer scat abounds.
Such beautiful creatures.  I wish I could touch them. Walk up to them and look into their eyes... to let them know that I'm OK, that they don't have to fear me.
But, it's a good thing that they are fearful. Death is always close. I hear it at night... when the coyotes kill something and howl their victories on some distant hill... and... there are all the other predators that own the hills from here to the river. I fear for these lovely creatures, especially at night. I'm reminded of a favorite Mary Oliver poem called

This morning I watched the deer
with beautiful lips touching the tips
of the cranberries, setting their hooves down
in the dampness carelessly, isn’t it after all
the carpet of their house, their home, whose roof
is the sky?

Why, then, was I suddenly miserable?

Well, then, this is nothing much.
This is just the heaviness of the body watching the swallows
gliding just under that roof.

This is the wish that the deer would not lift their heads
and leap away, leaving me there alone.
This is to wish to touch their faces, their brown wrists-
to sing some sparkling poem into
the folds of their ears,

then walk with them,
over the hills
and over the hills

and into the impossible trees.

( From Mary Oliver's book, Why I Wake Early.)

Berry Picking Morning

We had planned for this day. My friend "MJ", from Wallace, came to pick me up early this morning.
We drove over the Mokelumne River and south toward the farm were we picked berries last year, just after a terrible fire that almost destroyed these poor folks house and everything they owned. This was the post that I wrote on the day of that fire. This is the post that I wrote when we went to pick berries and about the ranch where these folks live.
 When the fire burned, that day, we watched from our house on the north side of the river and prayed that it wouldn't jump the river, or that we would never have a fire like that. Ironically, not three weeks later we had a horrible fire of our own that almost burned our house down. Both this couple and ourselves were saved by the quick work of the fireman, the bombers, the helicopters dropping river water on us and the defensible space around our houses.
So this year, we were invited to come and pick berries again. We brought another friend named Heather, from the gourd club, and we arrived at the farm. The woman told us we could pick as long as we wanted to.
The whole area looked so different from a year ago. The burned area is covered with grass now, dry though it is in the summer. Quite a lot of the trees in the fire zone survived.

We drove into the same shaded area that we went to last year and parked. The blackberries were abundant.

Lots of ripe ones.

More than last year.

As if the berry stickers weren't enough, we also had to contend with these thistles. They were very pretty, but one more thing to avoid in our quest for the beautiful black berry. We watched for snakes and any other creature that call this place theirs.
We picked all morning. It was a hot day and labor intensive. Luckily, there were big trees that shaded some of the area.
This beautiful Valley Oak was so huge. It must have been very old.

It wasn't really shading us, but its presence was like a guardian looking down on us.
We picked berries as the morning got warmer and warmer.

Heather brought these great plastic containers that she had attached string to so we could carry them around our neck, which freed up both hands for picking faster.

This is such a good idea.

Fill up the small container and empty it into a bigger one.

It was a fun but messy job...

We would rest a bit...

And then we would go pick more berries... until the heat and the bugs and the tiredness hit.Then we called it quits.

This was part of what we picked.
I think that Heather had done this before... she was very organized.

Will you look at this. She could have sold them right off the back of the truck. She was really into this berry picking. We had to pull her out of the bushes and make her stop.

But then, she is a young'un and still has a lot of energy.

So, we had a great morning and came home with lots of blackberries. Tomorrow I will put mine in freezer bags and freeze most of them. I'll make a pie with the rest.
Next Monday they will come over to my place and we will have a JAM SESSION. It's fun to make jam with friends. We'll make a mess together, in one kitchen, and have some beautiful jars of jam to eat all winter. Yummmm!

My Friend's visit and the Saga of the Baby Birds

I waved goodbye to my friend "C" this morning as she drove down the road. She left earlier because the day is going to be very hot and the valley even hotter. She wanted to drive home, pick up her cat, Max, and settle into her home by the lake before the heat of the afternoon finds it's footing.Summer has arrived.
She drove up on Saturday from Sacramento. We had such a nice visit. Mostly stayed around the farm, but we did go out to dinner Saturday night at Teresa's, our local Italian restaurant. Was it good!!

"C" had a knee replacement about 5 mos. ago and is doing really well. As hard as it was to go through, it will be worth it in the long run. She did all the exercises and physical therapy that she was suppose to and it has paid off. She is walking without pain and has, for all purposes, a new knee.

While "C" was here I had a meltdown over these baby birds. It appeared that they had been abandoned by the parents. As I told you in another post, these House Finches had built a nest in a container right next to the front door and that door, being our only access to the front yard, was causing the little family of Linnets a lot of stress. Well Friday afternoon the babies were looking dehydrated and very sad.  Two of them looked dead. The parents were no where to be seen. The Internet said that I should watch the nest and the parents should come every 30 mins or so. There were a "no show" that afternoon and on Saturday morning they were no where to be seen. The babies were looking really bad. So when "C" got here I was beside myself with worry and not sure what to do. She and I decided to move the whole container with the fake greenery, the nest and the birds in it over to the other end of the porch.

You can see the tin with the babies and nest hanging on the last porch post in the photo above. Carl was so curious about the birds and even though they were not making any noise, he kept watching them.
I made some white bread soaked in warm milk and using some tweezers, got the babies to eat some of the wet bread. Three of them started opening their mouths and taking the food. The other two were underneath and didn't seem to respond at all. We moved the Hummingbird feeder away from the babies and decided that we would watch out of the living room window for a while and see what might happen. It was almost 24 hours since I had seen the parents.
Within 20 minutes or so, guess who arrived? Yep! Mom and Dad. First Dad arrived and flew over to the front door. He was having a fit and I was beginning to think that I had made a big mistake. But, Mom flew right to the nest and started feeding the babies. I was so relieved that I almost cried.  I know that they had not been there all morning or the afternoon before and those babies were dying for some food. I don't know where the parents went or why. I only know that I was sure they were gone forever. Maybe they were tired of the commotion at the door. Maybe they were afraid of the other nest of sparrows in the eaves near them. Maybe the Hummers where bothering them. We have a little Hummer we call the "crazy one" who chased the other Hummers away from the feeder and zooms around the yard like a dive bomber. He kept flying around the nest and acting like he was going to attack the babies. I was ready to get the fly swatter.
I will never know what the problem was, but those two Finches didn't show up for about 24 hours and those babies almost died. Thanks to my friend's encouragement and help with moving the nest, the babies are doing well.
I will still put a chair and pad underneath the nest just in case one of them falls out. They are so small but they are packed in there like sardines. I could just see one of them trying to spread it's wings and flipping itself right out of the nest. I don't know why I'm being so paranoid about all of this. Nature has it's moments that are hard to watch and understand. I live with this. I shouldn't be so sensitive but these babies are so needy..., and sweet.

Look at these little guys. They are getting cuter and bigger by the minute. They look at me like they know that we helped them. I love to think they do anyway. All five are doing well. Maybe Mom and Dad took a short vacation for the day on Friday but that's not going to cut it around here. They need to finish what they started. They can have their fun after the kids are grown and gone, like the rest of us.

The other big news is that my wonderful, computer literate friend "C" sat down and showed me how to transfer more that three photos  to my blog on one post. I have never known how to do this. That's why you never saw more than 3 photos on any one blog post before today. That's why you saw so many collage photos. Picassa would not let me post more that 3 photos from their site. Well, you live and learn. I made the forth photo extra large just to celebrate. Now I can have some fun...
Thanks "C". You've brought me one step closer to knowing what I'm doing here. You're a sweetie. Come up again soon.

TRUST

One frosty morning I found this bumblebee on a mum in the lower garden. It was cold, wet and not moving or flying.








So I reached down and held my hand close to it and ,amazingly, it crawled up onto my hand.
I walked back up to the house and put it on a rose near my front porch. It was warmer there and drier.




In an hour or so I went back to see if it was all right and the bee was gone. I sat on the porch and, as I listened to the beginnings of the day, I thought I heard a small voice somewhere say,"Thank you, Farmlady."

"You're welcome, Bumblebee."

The Magic Metamorphosed Moth ,"Inch worm, inch worm, measuring the marigolds":

There you were, on my walk yesterday, spread out on the ground, looking like a small rock or leaf.
I almost stepped on you, little one. My eyes don't see as well as they use to and sometimes I don't see things for what they are. We had a moment didn't we? How often have you let a human being touch you? Did I smell different? Was I a monster in your eyes? I don't think so. You crawled onto my hand as if you knew me...., or were you just being brave?
In your former life, as a inch worm, I read that you are a pest and chew on trees and shrubs. Well, I guess that metamorphosis is a wonderful thing for you: Letting go of all those bad habits and becoming something new and beautiful. I wish we could all do that. Some say we can.

A SENSE OF WONDER

A few days ago, on a walk up the hill, I came across an odd work of nature. It seemed to be only in one area and very few in number: A blade of grass, less than a foot high, with an oak leaf speared on it. At first I thought that heavy wind or some strange downward force of nature produced this oddity, but when I showed the pictures to my husband, he said that it was more likely that the blade of grass grew up through the oak leaf already on the ground.As much as I wanted it to be some strange phenomenon of nature and wind, I had to agree that his idea made more sense. The prospector has always kept me grounded. I do love him for that.
I still think it's strange and I marvel at the strength of nature. That a delicate, fragile blade of grass can have such power leaves me with a sense of wonder that never ends. I offer these photos for your observation and comment.

Shadow Sense