Another vote for krampus -

We should have a Maintainers Bird Walk at Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge MA as the Spring Warblers arrive.

Allison, I'm terribly sorry to hear this news about Chico.

Sounds like another time just to take it step by step, as news comes in, and just do what needs to be done.

I'm encouraged by what I've read here from others about dogs that did well, even with missing legs. (I can add another of those testimonies: A friend of a friend had a small spotted mixed breed dog named Tripod, very lively, with a fierce attitude.)

Hugs, darling. Hugs to your puppy, too.

Allison :hug:. Hoping for the best possible outcome for Chico.

Dagmar :(

That sounds lovely! I'll bring a lunch :lol: I do love to hear the sound of all the birds in the spring. We have several around the house who start singing before the sun comes up and I sometimes sit on the back steps and listen to all of them joining in as I drink my coffee.

Toronto lost a lot of its bird life and only for the last 10 years or so has there been a resurgence of birds like cardinals, bluejays, grackles, finches, etc. For a long time it seemed all we had were sparrows and pigeons. And Canada geese, who no longer migrate.

I have an Audubon bird book at home and try to look up anything new I see while out on my daily travels. Still haven't identified the little black and white ducks who dive underneath the water and come up quite a distance away.

Dagmar :mag:

Check out American Coot - Cornell Site - since they aren't in the duck section of your Audubon guide, but with the Rails. You'll immediately know them once someone tells you they bob like chickens and don't have webbed feet.

Allison, I'm so sorry about Chico. I hope the x-rays come back clean and he has a swift recovery from the amputation.

I totally lost my resolve to not drink last night (gee, I wonder why?) but somehow ended up down half a pound anyway. Still above ticker (151 vs 150). I was pondering whether or not not change the ticker this morning, but decided against it. Perhaps that will be my impetus to get back down there and perhaps enter the 140's later this week. I really need to get cracking in order to meet my end of May goal.

This made me laugh! We were talking about this over the weekend: While I never watched it, my friend said that on Ally McBeal there was a male character who enjoyed touching other people's neck whattle. I have a horrible one myself--mostly inherited--the entire Fehr family seems to have it.

Allison, I would have done the same, given the day you had. :( Sometimes life gets in the way of goals for a while. Be good to yourself!

Re birds, we attract some interesting specimens - we have hilly grassland, split by a creek, and we're across the road from a swamp. There are a pair of sandhill cranes nesting nearby. They walk through the yard every now and then. We have bluebirds, cedar waxwings, woodpeckers of every stripe, the occasional Baltimore oriole, a huge population of robins and redwing blackbirds, and all the other colorful songbirds. We've planted a lot of features to attract them. And feral cats are, um, "firmly encouraged not to prowl" (DS12 is armed and dangerous).

Back to ticker and ready to say farewell to the 150's. My erratic schedule has been causing me to miss my traditional dinner time a few days a week. I usually eat a reasonably substantial breakfast and lunch, so I've been able to make do with a yogurt, or cup of soup for dinner. I figure if I'm not waking up in the middle of the night hungry, it can't be a bad thing - I'm sure not going to force myself to eat a full meal an hour before I go to bed! Tonight I've removed all of the obstacles that would prevent me from going to water aerobics. I still have time to be stronger on my 45th bday than I was on my 44th ... but I have to get moving NOW. :frypan:

Allison, I am wishing all the best for Chico and his loving family. He is fortunate to have people who care so much for him when he is having a tough time.

Thank you everyone for your votes - we appear to be winning, going by the comments on the post and the fact that I have such an expansive network of random Internet strangers on my side. :)

Maintainers' birding trip would be fun! I had a GREAT birding day on Watch Hill, Rhode Island on Easter Sunday - we saw ospreys, piping plovers, Atlantic Brant geese (exciting, since the only wild geese in Albany/Troy are Canada geese), terns, sandpipers, killdeer...I love shorebirds and beach birds.

ICUwishing Good luck kissing the 150s goodbye! You're doing really well given the erratic schedule!

BillBlueEyes Coots are great - they're bullies and pests, but their FEET are fantastic.

Dagmar It's sad when an area loses its bird life - it seems like here there are more grackles and starlings than anything else. Totally not how I remembered it as a kid!

saef Enjoy the Pennsyltucky Dutch country! I've always wanted to visit there.

The birds we see at our golf course: Mallard ducks, Canada geese, coots, snowy egrets, and (according to MIL) a Great Blue Herring! (She meant heron!!! LOL. She does this all the time--and she doesn't realize she has it wrong.) Currently we have a mourning dove in a nest between our garage doors (in some bougainvillea). I think the nest has two eggs. I'm hoping we don't get a strong wind before they hatch. It's so sad to see broken eggs on the ground. We also have lots of ravens, roadrunners and various other migratory songbirds.

I wish I could identify more of the local birds here. I went for a run around the lake (= retention pond) by work today and there were baby mallard ducks. So cute! Birds I can easily identify that we see fairly regularly: Canada geese, mallard ducks, some other duck that google tells me is probably a lesser scaup, robins, cardinals, mourning doves, some kind of egrets or herons that I see at a distance but can't identify specifically, starlings, and a bunch more that I'm not sure what they are.

In other wildlife news, this gigantic bunny was trying to eat everything in our yard yesterday. When I got home Carter and I went out into the backyard, and both suddenly saw this huge bunny sitting there. At least, it was huge compared to the bunnies we usually see! Carter chased it and it ran to the front of the house, then I chased it into the neighbor's yard (Carter is confined to chasing bunnies in the fenced backyard). Half an hour later Carter starts barking -- the bunny is back in the yard again! He chased it off once more. 15 minutes later, he's there again! Either that or there were like four bunnies. In any case hopefully being chased a few times finally scared it off. I eventually shut the blinds so if it came back Carter wouldn't notice. :p

Back home after 2 days of birthday partying and as I feared miles of food. I tried to use portion control but don't think I did too well.

Jessica~we have tons of bunnies where we live and typically we'll get one or two in our back yard. They'll hide in the bushes if we go outside. 9 times out of 10 the cats will scare them from their hiding place (but don't ever seem to notice them running off). The dog, who is usually near the bunny's escape route, doesn't often even see them run off! If he does, he'll give chase but he knows he can't catch them--he usually just runs a bit and turns back to let us know the bunny is gone. If the cats are inside (we only allow them out supervised and only in the back yard) and they see a bunny, they start complaining and asking us to let them out.

Where are you seeing them, on ponds or out on Lake Ontario, riding the swells?

Coots are entirely black and prefer to be on ponds or fairly still water. The startling thing about them is the light-colored bill against the very dark bird.

So I think you are seeing buffleheads or common golden eyes. They are really an oilslick green or purple, that is, iridescent, like a grackle, but most of the time they look black.

If they are very small, with a lot of white on the face, they're bufflehead.

Goldeneye have less white on the face, more white beneath, and in my experience, they're more likely to be in rough waters.

Take a look in the guide and see if these look familiar.

I'm trying to recover from 8 very long, stressful days of work. The good news is I worked so many hours last week & weekends I'm off work most of this week. I've been dragging and just very tired, so I'm trying to let myself get some extra sleep. I've been taking Emma for long walks and getting back to the gym as well, not being a total slacker. I have full sympathy for those who have long commutes. Driving 4 hours a day on top of work was really hard, and I was exhausted and didn't want to do anything when I got home.

Allison, I'm so sorry to hear about Chico. I've known several dogs with less than 4 limbs and they were all just fine. Emma and I are sending Chico all of our positive thoughts.