Farm Fresh: Wild Things

 We have a beautiful family of Eastern Blue Birds nesting in our bird houses. On Saturday I saw what looked at first like a toad hopping in the grass -- it was a little fledgling. I had my garden gloves on so I picked it up to look at it.  It was uninjured, but I was not sure where his nest was.  The mama and dad started swooping at me. They obviously were watching him.  Then I found another fledgling, this one with a compound leg fracture of some kind, badly twisted and bloody.

  We googled it and learned that the parents would continue to care for them, even though they were on the ground.  We put them by their tree. But then hubby saw one in the mouth of our cat and we decided not to leave things entirely to Mother Nature.

  We brought the healthy fledgling (rescued from the cat) inside.  He is in the brooder box. Big sister A is carefully hand feeding him chicken food.  We need to figure out which bird house contains his home. We did not see the injured one... maybe he was already eaten?

 In other news, a large and skin crawlingly scary black widow was spotted on our exterior window sill just outside the back door.  She was loading her egg sac with babies.  Soooo scary! But I was glad that we saw it and could get rid of it quickly.We watched her sticking her butt in the sac over and over from inside the house.  Then when daddy came home from work he used the spray to kill her and the babies. Uncle P happened to be there and lent a hand based on his experience with them.

Last but not least, I thank my 5 rodent wranglers for being such good hunters. This is the biggest kill I have seen them have...  A young wild rabbit.  I would be horrified if they bothered my farm rabbits. But these wild ones will eat my garden and I have to say that it is for the best. I see them killing at least 2-3 rodents a week. I believe they kill a lot more than those I see. This gal in particular, Sapphire, is the most feral and seems to be a skilled hunter.  Luckily I have an excellent zoom on my camera or I would not have been able to take any of these photos.