Friday, October 12, 2012

Summer wildlife visitors

Summer started slowly.  Cherries usually begin ripening in early July....but not this year.


Quigley, the squirrel, came by to check out the bird feeders that he had cleared out, in hopes they had been refilled.  He was also busy clambering among the trees and scurrying through the undergrowth collecting acorns and other nutty treats to store away.


The cherry tree in the back yard was substantial nearly twenty years ago when we moved here, so you can imagine how large it is now.  Many of the cherries were far too high to reach, and when the birds and raccoons got up there, we were treated to cherry bombs on the deck.  Splat! It was decided to prune some of the higher branches.  Next year we will finish off the pruning to make it even better.

I was thrilled to see a robin feeding a cherry to its young one.


Cherries starting to ripen on July 24, 2012, nearly three weeks later than usual.


Once the high branches were cut down, we were able to pick bowl fulls of cherries from them!  The branches were piled  to cut into firewood.  Even the little twigs were gathered and bundled together for kindling.  One of my sons, who did most of the pruning, took them all away to use in his woodburning stove and outdoor pizza oven!  However, before the wood was chopped up, we left it in a pile because the deer were so happy to eat fresh leaves served at such a perfect height!


Of course, a little nap after enjoying such a meal is understandable.


The pear and apple trees also offer tantalizing nibbles as this fine fellow demonstrated.

Yum!


More summer photos to follow soon :)
 

6 comments:

  1. A great young stag...amazing to see when their antlers are still in velvet.

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    1. The velvet antlers are beautiful indeed. So nice to see him right in the back yard. Makes me think I live in a park :)

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  2. Boy, you have so much pruning help! And certainly cooperative with your photographic endeavors. When my aunt had a pet rabbit, all her tomato bushes were trimmed from the ground to rabbit height ;-) Hope your cherry tree does really well next season.

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    1. Hi Nikki ~ Yes, the deer seem to have a route that they walk through the neighbourhood, pruning as they go! That's why I've given up planting too much that isn't corralled behind a fence. I bet your aunt's bunny loved those tomato plants, which have such a pleasant aroma. Perhaps that's why there are hanging planters for the baby tomatoes :) I hope the cherry tree does OK next year too, but it was causing some problems they way it was, and all cherries were out of reach for us. It will be interesting, for sure.

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  3. How lovely to have deer wandering through even if it means having to fence in some of your plants.

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  4. How wonderful to see such wildlife on your doorstep. Cherries did poorly here this year due to the weather so it seems that we'll all be hoping for better things next year. Flighty xx

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