On the wild side

I mentioned recently that our backyard was starting to resemble scenes from Wild Kingdom, and it’s only gotten worse — I mean better! — since then. I often sit downstairs by the patio for hours on end, watching the parade of animals. The show usually features mostly birds, but occasionally there are other special visitors, like the two fawns that peered out from the edge of the woods one morning.

One of my favorite visitors is the family of turkeys — two adults and 13 babies — who regularly walk through the yard. Mostly they stick together, but the other day I got a thrill when one of the adults left the family and started marching right up to the patio, and I thought I’d soon be staring at it face-to-face. But it stopped short. Still, it was an exciting moment!

The chipmunk is a recent visitor, much to the dismay of my mamas. They nicknamed it Quagmire, after the puffy-cheeked character on Family Guy, because of the way it greedily stuffs its cheeks with more food than it could ever possibly eat, then leaps off the feeder and into the woods on its way to who knows where. Maybe it has a family it’s feeding and we shouldn’t be so quick to judge.

I also saw a bunny hopping through recently, nervously twitching as it paused occasionally to eat the clover that dominates our yard, now that Mama C has come to her senses and given up on her fantasy of having a fairway-quality lawn. And I think I’m jumpy sometimes!

My mamas recently added another bird feeder — this one designed to hold half a fresh orange that supposedly attracts Baltimore Orioles. My first thought was, “Ha, good luck with that!” since it’s not a species we usually see around here, but soon the feeder lived up to its hype.

One of our longtime backyard residents is Chucky the woodchuck, who lives under the shed, but frequently ventures out to munch on the clover and sun himself. This year he seems to have found a companion, though she is apparently more of a homebody and doesn’t come out as often.

To date, we have identified 33 different species of birds that have visited our yard. They are all beautiful in their own way and have their own personalities, but I have to say, I’m partial to the male cardinal. I just think that black mask gives him such a bad-boy look, like he’s ready to go hold up a convenience store or something! Let’s just say I sometimes have a thing for badness. But the male cardinal is actually very sweet. We’ve watched him repeatedly feed a female cardinal in an effort to court her. He’s a keeper!

And that’s my wildlife report for now. We’re just waiting for the day when a bear lumbers through.