Bird watcher

This winter Baby T learned to animal watch. We are lucky enough to have a wood line a rock’s throw from our back porch. I’ve lived here as a kid so I know how many animals run through these parts and though it may not be a lot to some it is to us. We get to see them almost on a daily basis. And feeding them is a little routine of ours.

Small bits of bread, lettuce and vegetable peelings are what we bring to the edge of the woods. We’ll get the chance to watch Squirrels fight over a piece of toast. And try to catch the rabbits eat since they only get brave towards nighttime. But the newest thing is the birds. Some come but this winter we didn’t see too many. Since it’s been warming up we’ve been seeing more and more action out our kitchen window.

We finally bought a birdfeeder and rigged it to the closest tree to our house. The only sad thing about feeding the animals is that as soon as we put the food out Baby T is out there calling them. How you would call your dog best explains how Baby T calls out to the birds. If we had put out lettuce and peeling Baby T will yell, “Come on rabbits, we got your food.” Then he looks disappointed and says to me, “They’re not hear us Mommy” But he like the birds because they come out everyday for sure.

We thought we would try an experiment this winter. At the beginning when it first started to snow we would walk all the way out to the woods and maybe a little into them, knowing the animals are wild and will probably be too scared of dogs or us to venture out. But as the snow got deeper and the wind blew harder we would only go about halfway to the treeline. Then we just started opening our kitchen window and throwing the food out about 5 feet. Wouldn’t you know it, that over the course of a few months those rabbits got so brave that they would come all the way up to the house.

Our first time knowing it was them for sure was seeing all the tracks. It’s surreal to Baby T to have a highway on one side of his house and undisturbed woods in the back of it. To him it is two worlds and that’s what he calls them. We knew it was those rabbits because the same path was used for them to make their trip out to the open yard and finally next to our home. So we started being sneaky, leaving the blinds open only a little so we could see them and not be seen ourselves. But like Baby T says those big ears hear big things so every time we got near the window they must have heard us and ran off. All we could catch was a tail scurrying off into the woods.

But about a month ago they were so used to us feeding them that they came right up and seemed unfazed by our spying. I swear those guys were so close if my window was open I could grab one up. And the 3 feet of snow outside made them level with our window. So to Baby T he had a window filled with rabbits, squirrels and a few birds. He thinks it’s an aquarium until you actually open the window. So now that the snow is gone the animals are too. They can find other food now. Except for the hungry birds, they’re still out there. So Baby T has a birdfeeder out back for them and he’s getting ready to put his birdhouse out too. Because he really has turned into quite the little birdwatcher.