Hawks and Hay

It’s been beautiful the last few days. So glad I live in the country. If I was still back in the city I would be watching people wash their cars instead of watching horses graze. And listening to boom boxes, crying kids and sirens instead of birds singing. This Fourth of July we have new neighbors and there was no noisy illegal fireworks going off. We stayed home to leisurely mornings and work when we wanted.

We woke this morning to the smell of fresh cut hay drifting in the windows. The farmers all around us aren’t resting, they are using this spell of warm sunny weather to get second cutting in. It has been hard to find a few dry days in a row to get hay done. The alfalfa field just SE of us was in full bloom. I got some pretty pictures made of it. Hay prices may be high again this fall. I hear it’s still over $4.00 a bale at auction.

The wheat fields up the road are turning golden. A sign of summer maturing, it’s pretty but I want summer to go a little slower, at least now while the weather is comfortable. My tune may change in August when it’s hot and muggy.

We have a large hawk that has a fledgling in our woods. I think it’s a Red Shouldered Hawk. I surprised Mom by the pond and she flew off with something large. Later when I was walking by the backside of the pond I found a large rabbit with its guts torn out. I sat quietly behind the barn with my binoculars locating the screaming Mom in one tree and screeching baby in another. He or she is as big as mom. She sits somewhere, often where I can’t see her and does that hawk scream and baby just keeps up that screeching begging. I think she is trying to get it to hunt. I have seen them swoop around together. Usually however if mom spots me she shuts up and hides. Baby just keeps screeching. The noise goes on almost all day and while it’s fascinating to watch, the noise can get annoying. It moves from tree to tree sometimes it’s fairly close and sometimes farther out.

I have been watching other bird babies at the feeder. The Orioles have several young ones coming with them to eat jelly. Baby Red Winged Blackbirds are trying to learn how to perch on the suet feeder. Baby doves are on the ground and will almost let you step on them. How they don’t get eaten by cats is a miracle. There is a whole flock of baby pheasants that I see on the road, but they don’t come by the feeder.

The flowers are great right now too, both in the garden and in the field. Now that there are no sheep in the pasture it’s covered with daisies and wild sweet peas and other wild flowers. I have beautiful lilies and roses in bloom. I hope summer continues to be kind.