912, a Wildlife Refuge?

Standing at the picture window, talking to Karen on the phone and looking out over our backyard, I got to thinking that we had become a wildlife refuge. Our friend neighborhood groundhog (who, we think, lives under our deck), five or six feisty squirrels, a chipmunk or two and flocks of colorful birds—cardinals, bluejays, robins, a red-headed woodpecker, plus LBJs (as Jenny calls them)—all flitted (or in the case of the groundhog, waddled) around the yard, which is fast becoming a carpet of yellow. It was fun to describe these animals and bird to her, and she replied in kind by saying that a skunk lives in their backyard!

And then there’s these colorful birds, taking refuge near our new river birch tree, on their way to Florida. Actually, it’s the youth group that wants to go to Florida for its triennial summer conference and one way they are raising money for it is to plant flamingos in various yards and the church homeowners must pay to have them removed (with the rights to send them to their next destination) with an additional insurance cost to guarantee that they don’t return any time soon. Notice too the new tree in this second picture.