Last week, I spotted my first morel of the season. Here it is, a moderately sized, half-attached morel. I snapped a quick picture, and that was the last one I thought to take because when I start finding morels, the last thing on my mind is the camera. I revert to the childish delight of [...]

Their eyes are wide open, and they’ve found their voices. They bark. They whine. They growl as they awkwardly wrestle and try to pounce. They haven’t much finesse yet, but they’re cute while they practice playing. They still spend a lot of time sleeping, too.
Notice how intensely both pups [...]

This morning I found this brown thrasher (Toxostoma rufum) in the corn barrel in the feed room. It stared at me, but didn’t move. My father says that’s typical thrasher behavior. ‘They’re weird birds,’ he said. It even waited for me to jog to the house, grab a camera and jog back. Or maybe it [...]

Hippo’s the one on the right. He’s the largest male, the largest altogether of the litter. He was the first to open his eyes, and he’s usually the first one headed for mama when she enters the room. The little female pup next to him has the sweetest face, and if she’s [...]

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The common violet is one of my favorite spring flowers. It’s fragrant, pretty, tough and prolific. What’s not to love? This particularly sturdy violet pushed its way through a layer of sand deposited a couple weeks ago when the creek overran its banks and flooded the crossing we use to access [...]

Same puppy as pictured here, but twice the size now. I wish I’d weighed them all that first day, just for curiosity’s sake, and so I could say with statistical authority, ‘yes, it’s a proven fact. They’ve doubled in weight.’ Oh well. You’ll just have to trust me.
We’ve been [...]

Last night we had a hard frost, and it nipped a few tender plants and blossoms. As the sun eased over the horizon, I trudged out to the orchard, camera in hand to document the damage. The warmth of the morning sunlight already was melting the frost crystals from the blooms, so the damage wasn’t [...]

Meet Spraddles. This American Buff gosling is about a week old now and having trouble with its legs. Spraddle-legs or splay-legs is a condition often caused when a new hatchling can’t get good footing to stand up well. No doubt that’s what happened to this little guy (gal?). It’s probably my fault, too.

Here’s what happened. [...]

The genius husband swiped the largest pup of the litter for a while and let it nap on his belly. Puppies make such sweet, happy sounds when they’re warm and comfy. Mama Dinah’s beginning to relax a bit and spent some time helping us outdoors with chores. She even found the [...]