The activity in our backyard picked up considerably this summer. Last spring, I hung a bird feeder from a tree branch outside our sunroom. It took a few weeks, but the feeder began attracting a variety of birds. I was refilling it every day.
So I decided to buy a larger feeder. Before long, both of them needed refilling daily as the number of birds visiting them increased. For Father’s Day, Martha got me a peanut feeder to attract woodpeckers, and I purchased another feeder so I could experiment with different blends of birdseed.
The result is a mesmerizing and sometimes comic display. Wrens, sparrows, cardinals, goldfinches, purple finches, grosbeaks, chickadees, nuthatches, titmice and woodpeckers flock to this part of our yard, flittering between the feeders, the birdbath, the birdhouse, and a thick bush just over the fence in our neighbors’ yard. It is not unusual to see a dozen birds at the feeders, another dozen or so perched on the chain-link fence awaiting their turns, and morning doves, squirrels, chipmunks, and rabbits all foraging on the ground below the feeders where seeds and shells have fallen. At one point this summer, we decided that multiple sparrow families had declared “learn how to feed yourself” week. Dozens of tiny sparrows would fly from the birdhouse or the bush at the same time, some perching at the feeder, some landing on the ground, others not ready to go any further than the fence. In addition to all of this, monarch butterflies and hummingbirds have frequented the butterfly bush and the flowers planted in the garden box on the ground. Martha calls this area the “open table” with “enough for everyone.” I call it our “peaceable kingdom.” It is a constant source of total delight.
