Of frogs, hawks, hummingbirds, and deer

Here’s our final entry for June – the summer is fully underway at the Hawksbill Cabin. We await the completion of our pool repairs, but the two other large projects are coming to a close. July will be a busy work and travel month, so the pace of entries will slow, even though our interest in sharing this experience will not wane! A final logistics note, we will be changing our mobile phone carrier to one with better coverage in the cabin area – this may temporarily reduce the number of phone-cam postings.

On our arrival Friday night last weekend, we were greeted by a chorus of deep-voiced frogs over in the hollow. These were booming grunts, nothing like the high-pitched songs of the spring frogs. As I unloaded the car, I wanted to reach for a flashlight; sometimes it sounded like there were a couple of men walking down the road talking. The singing of the frogs was varied and sounded like a conversation.

The next wildlife encounter involved our nesting hawks. There are two previous entries about these birds at:
http://hawksbillcabin.blogspot.com/2008/06/then-there-were-three-nesting-hawks.html
http://hawksbillcabin.blogspot.com/2008/05/nesting-hawks.html

The adults are staying away from the nest for longer and longer periods. But they must stay nearby, as they appear almost instantly any time a blue jay lights in their tree, or a crow flies through the neighborhood. And last night, I saw the male arrive with a small prey bird to feed the nestlings.

We still have not managed to catch the nestlings in a photo suitable for posting. We watched the nest carefully over the weekend and have been able to identify three nestlings – they are probably about 2/3 adult size now, so the largest of them may be able to fly by next weekend. During the day, they jostle about in the nests –we can hear these squabbles down below. And they venture out now onto the neighboring branches, never more than 6 or 8 feet from the nest.
Our vantage point, directly below, obscures them for photography purposes. But we have been able to get a good look at them through the binoculars from time to time.

Another wildlife treat over the weekend was the appearance of a humming bird in the yard. This little creature showed up while I was out watching the hawks. It flew up out of the hollow and buzzed into the pine boughs of the hawks’ tree, then out and along the tree tops of some of our dogwoods. It stopped by the hostas, not yet in bloom, then onto the back of the house (headed for the bee balm, maybe, or the lilies). That was a pleasant surprise.

Final nature highlight of the day was a sighting of the large doe that lives in our neighborhood. I had a glimpse of her last weekend during one of the storms as she moved from the hollow along our driveway to the woods behind us. I think this is the same doe that had two fawns with her last year – they weren’t with her this time, although I saw the three of them together once during the early Spring.

Yesterday morning she was out on the road, walking along the front of our lots. She crossed the creek and climbed part way up the hill before something startled her, and she headed back into the hollow. A few minutes later I saw her by the stream before she headed deeper into the hollow.

That’s all for the cabin posting today. It’s kind of like an outdoor lifestyle out there. More to come.