www.KitGuitarsForum.com

When I discovered a thread about birds, I had to chime in (however late), being a long-time birder (about as long as I have been hacking away at folk tunes.) I assume your hummers were Anna's? I have never found a hummer nest on my property, though we are feeding Anna's Hummingbirds year-round, even through snow and freezing temperatures through the winter, and Rufous Hummers in the summer. Here is a photo of a female Rufous I watched as she raised and fledged two young:

http://strayfeathersphotography.zenfoli ... a#h3e52e3a

Birds are my excuse for not getting as much work done on my guitar project in the spring and summer . . .

Ah, Japanese Maples, I love them, I have five different ones that I'm growing right now. I have tried them in the past and never had much luck with them. I had a bird experience that I'll never forget. About fifteen years ago I was paddling my pirogue (pronounced pee-row, Sort of a flat bottomed canoe that has a shallow draft and can go in very shallow water) up Gum Bayou (off of the Pearl River). I was fishing for sac-au-lait , that's Crappie for you non-coonass folks, it's French meaning sack of milk because the meat is very white. Anyway I got off track a little, sorry, no more history lessons, back to the story. I hadn't started fishing yet, I was on the way to my spot when all of a sudden a male Wood Duck came flying erratically across the bayou in front of me and kind of crash landed on the edge of the bayou and the swamp and was acting all crazy like. He slowly eased his way into the swamp and I lost sight of him, about that time a big @$$ owl came flying across the bayou in the same direction as the Wood Duck and landed in a tree up in the swamp. I just sat there taking it all in and I thought wow, that duck is wounded and that owl is trying to get him. After several minutes I saw a female Wood Duck swimming across the bayou followed by a clutch of ducklings and then it all made sense to me. The Drake was putting on a Hollywood act, acting like he was injured so as to draw the owl away from the baby duckies. I decided right then that it was a good trip even if I don't catch a single fish. Never will forget that.

David L

A pileated woodpecker behind my house yesterday. I love these birds

Nice, John, what is that greenish, white looking thing with the grid pattern on it?

David L

a suet cake for the birds
we got through about 1000 lbs a year of bird feed