Bold Bullfrog

Either too bold or too cold to jump, this bullfrog posed very nicely for his portrait at the edge of Reservoir Pond at the Cincinnati Nature Center today.

Baby bluebirds grow so quickly

I hope you are enjoying watching my baby bluebirds grow.

Here they are at 5 days old

and 6 days old.

And here they are today, 7 days old.

The feather tracts are becoming obvious

and the primaries are erupting along the wing.

The Bridge of Clermont County

April's recent comment reminded me that I haven't done a post about my home county recently. Here's a quickie on the last covered bridge in Clermont County. It is in Stonelick Township, in the northern part of the county.


I like covered bridges that are still functional. There are some old bridges in Ohio that are deemed unsafe for travel and many new ones that are purely decorative, but to see an old covered bridge that is still being used for its original purpose connects me to the past, and I just have to drive it.


The Stonelick bridge was built in 1878. It is 140 feet long, and uses 12 Howe trusses, crossed wooden members with vertical iron rods (a method which Howe patented in 1840) for support. It was placed on the National Register of Historical Places in 1974.

I like traveling across covered bridges, but I must say that the Stonelick Bridge is the most unfriendly covered bridge I have ever visited. These bridges are inherently tricky to drive, since they are usually one-lane wide and seem to always have limited line of sight. This bridge's neighbors must be tired of tourists gumming up the works, since the road on either side of the bridge is marked with barricades and signs saying "No Parking," "No Trespassing" and "Bridge Under Video Surveillance."


Call the Department of Homeland Security. KatDoc parked illegally to take these bridge photos.

Baby Bluebirds

I like to check my bluebirds daily while they are nesting. For one thing, it is important to monitor for problems, like predators or parasites. But mostly, it is just plain fun to watch the wee ones grow. There are a couple of "no-no" times to monitor your cavity nesting birds, though. I never nest check early in the morning or late at night, or in cold or wet weather. I don't want to chance spooking Mama off her nest and leaving the babies alone for too long when they are so tiny. That's why no pictures from the first two days of their life. It has been pretty cold, and I haven't been home during daylight hours.

These rules might be different for different species (or different people.) If I had chickadees, which I don't right now, I wouldn't do open-box checks at all. In my limited experience with chickadees, they are a lot spookier than bluebirds and more easily frightened away from the nest site. Tree swallows, on the other hand, are fearless, and will dive-bomb you while you are doing nest checks. Some people even report the female sitting tight to the nest and not leaving, even after the box is opened. I never worry about scaring the tree swallows away!

Here is my current crop of Eastern Bluebirds:

April 15, 3 days old

April 16, 4 days old
Can you see the ear openings just behind the eyes?

To answer Susan's question from the last bluebird post, no, the single egg in that photo wasn't a dud. Depending on what time I check the nest during Hatching Day, I might have 1, 2, 3, or even 4 unhatched eggs, waiting their turn. Usually, most eggs hatch in the same 24 hour period, but I have had one egg go a day longer a couple of times, and once I even had an egg hatch 3 days after the rest of the clutch, just as I was thinking about tossing it out. The runt struggled to keep up, and fledged a day later than his buddies, but he made it in the end.

Just for Julie

Here's a post with Julie Zickefoose in mind. Everyone else can look, but don't touch.

My Mom and I visited my sister in Columbus last Sunday, for her birthday. Because it was a yucky, cold, rainy day, I couldn't convince anyone to go for a nature walk with me, not even to see the Great Horned Owl babies at Green Lawn Cemetery. Instead, we went to the Franklin Park Conservatory, ostensibly for the butterfly exhibit. Alas and alack, all my butterfly pictures suck majorly. (Piece of crap "macro" function on my point-and-shoot camera --- Grrrr!!) When I sorted through my photos, I found a sort of theme: Things that Julie likes.

Random orchids. Don't even ask me their names, I couldn't begin to guess. I was just glad I knew they were orchids.






This one isn't real; it is a statue in the lobby. Still cool though, huh?


Gratuitous bonsais. They were in "cold storage," and were just getting ready to go back on display.



Birds. A pair of blue and gold macaws, shredding their bamboo "fence" (as well as newspaper and anything else they could get their beaks on)


And lories. You could go into the cage and feed them their nectar for $1.00 a cup. I just snuck in for some photos, which aren't the best, but you get the idea.


And, after the conservatory, we took a trip to Easton shopping center. Julie, I wish you had been there. You would have loved our day!

(Now, I suppose Julie will "chimp" all over this post, saying my orchids aren't really orchids but some close cousin, or that my lories are really lorikeets, or perhaps she will tell us the gender of the macaws, based on arcane feather-wear patterns. That's OK; this post is a gift, and it's hers to enjoy any way she chooses.)

Hatching Day

What a difference a day makes! This is what I saw in the bluebird box yesterday:

And here is what greeted me today:

Latest Creations

I haven't updated you on my pottery habit recently. Here are some of the newest things out of the kiln.


While attempting to make a mixing bowl one day, the clay got out of control and this pot made itself. As I trimmed it, I cut through the bottom accidentally once, then deliberately 3 more times. Here is the result - a planter!


This piece is made of brown clay, with a clear glaze. The speckled pattern is due to the grog (grit) in the clay.

After the struggles I had making a mixing bowl, I decided to back-track and work on some basic techniques. These simple cylinders were created while improving my skills in pulling the wall, compressing the sides and bottom, and working on balance and symmetry. First, two short cylinders, each about 3 inches wide by 2 inches high.

Morty's green, a dipping glaze, on white clay,
with ocean runner for the streaks

Taller cylinders followed, as I improved. The one on the left is 4" wide by 3" high, the one on the right is 3 1/2" by 3 3/4" high.

White clay dipped in paprika glaze

One of Rachel's standing assignments is to make a matched set of something. Most of us do mugs, and here is my set of four:


The glaze is my favorite, blue rutile. It is one glaze that I think looks good on both brown and white clay (these mugs are white) and I love the subtle variations in the colors in each piece.


The detail on the handles is from a rubber stamp of cat footprints that I rolled along the wet clay before attaching the handles to the mugs.


How do you make a set of four things? You make at least five, to allow for mistakes. The handle broke off this mug after bisque firing. I haven't decided what to do with it yet. Another "salsa bowl!"


I am currently in my third consecutive class at Scarborough Fair Pottery. Everybody in this session has had at least one class previously, no "newbies," so we are all learning new skills. Rachel had us review wedging and making cylinders, then we made bowls the first night.


I like the shape and size of mine, but I am still leaving too much clay at the bottom. My pieces tend to be rather heavy. The glazes here are the same bamboo and butternut combination I used on another bowl, but I don't like it on white clay as much as the brown.

Our next projects were a wide shallow bowl, a plate, and a "narrow-neck" piece. I'll show you those later. Next week, Rachel has threatened to show us teapots. I would love to make one, but it combines several of my most dreaded techniques - handles, narrow neck and a lid. Gulp!