Visitors, Visitors

Photo copyright Aji, 2015; all rights reserved.

New ones, old ones.

We have human visitors arriving tomorrow: A Kossack and her husband are detouring down our way on their way across the country. They're moving, but they're stopping here to see us and to arrange a special commission with Wings.

Which, of course, means that I spent the day cleaning, with my own detour intending to do some things in the gallery. That detour got detoured, and we wound up moving, at long last, a thoroughly massive shelving unit into it. It's one from the old gallery (and one he made by hand years ago), but it's a tight squeeze, which is why we've been putting it off. It's also an incredibly heavy job for two people, but with Wings's ingenuity (and back-breaking labor by both of us), we got it inside and placed, and the appropriate pieces of inventory are now cleaned and placed onto it. 

We had other visitors today: a small flock of tiny birds that move so rapidly it's impossible to tell, in the morning sunlight, what they really look like. They turned out to be yellow-rumped warblers, birds that theoretically are found here regularly, but that neither of us can recall having seen before. It appears that the whole clan is here now, though. In my language, there are two basic names for them: the cedar bird, which fits; and the bird who flees, which fits better. They love the aspens here, but they flit skittishly at the slightest sight or sound.

The Bullock's orioles (in my language, the alder birds) returned a few days ago. They're a pair, and today, it became clear that they are the same pair who raised their young directly overhead last year. And when I say "directly overhead," I mean exactly that: They built their nest in the aspen exactly over the picnic table where we ate breakfast (and often lunch) every day last summer. They allowed Wings to get photos of their young, and they brought them out as fledges to stretch their own wings even when we were present.  

Photo copyright Aji, 2015; all rights reserved.

The male mostly stood guard today, looking fat and happy, but utterly watchful the whole time. Meanwhile, his wife investigated their old nest thoroughly, and it was clear from their excited chatter back and forth that they thought they'd found their old home. I managed to get shots of her going over and under and in and out and through it, checking every minute detail, the two conversing rapidly the whole time. Eventually, she established to her satisfaction that it was indeed their old home, and apparently also that it was reparable for use this year; content, she hopped off to a branch alongside and sat like the queen she so clearly is.

Photo copyright Aji, 2015; all rights reserved.

I imagine we'll see them rebuilding over the days to come: Heaven knows there are more than enough tiny twigs and strands of horsehair and molted chicken feathers to make for a luxurious home for them.

If we're really lucky, maybe both clans will put in an appearance tomorrow for our other visitors.




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