When I was in Ontario, my brother-in-law Gavin was kind enough to take me out to a local birding area, where the birds are often willing to land on your hands for a seed or two. This area is in Ajax, a small community that forms part of the bigger city between Toronto and Oshawa.

Gavin and I both have the same camera (Olympus SP550UZ) and a common interest in seeing and photographing birds so it's a real pleasure to go to these kinds of places with him. With both of us so caught up in watching and taking pictures of the birds, I never feel like I'm irritating him when I stand still for ten minutes or more, trying to get the perfect shot of a nuthatch, for example. In fact, there was a white-breasted nuthatch there that day but my photographic efforts (in spite of long waits) were a waste of time. The nuthatch was just too quick for me.

On the other hand, I did get a number of really nice pictures of blue jays and black-capped chickadees. Gavin was even kind enough to get shots of both types of birds feeding on seeds and nuts out of my hand and even a couple of pictures of a chickadee snatching seeds off the top of my head. I don't include Gavin's shots here because 1) they're his and 2) they're still on my other computer.

Sadly, when we went into downtown Toronto to pick my sister up at her work, we discovered a dead bird on the sidewalk. It's a kind I've never seen and, even though I took clear pictures and sat with the photo and my bird books for some time, I still don't have a positive ID on the poor little guy. It looked to me like he'd been hit by a car, perhaps as he flew across the road.

A miserable sight but it kind of captured how I felt about Toronto's downtown core: lots of development at the cost of the natural world.

Yes, I'm becoming a true NBer, aren't I?

Tags: Blue Jay, Ontario, birding, black-capped chickadee

This morning, a Merlin, whistling through the branches of the trees, keeking out his characteristic note, chasing songbirds. As I walked Marlee Marie through the neighbourhood, this powerful little predator zipped by several times, an amazing sight.

Too bad I didn't have my camera handy. I rarely take it when I'm walking the dog.

I finished The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy's first four books yesterday, finally. I think of the four novels as being part of a single whole simply because I have a hard-cover edition from the mid-1980s, which includes all the books that had been written to that point: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy; The Restaurant at the End of the Universe; Life, the Universe and Everything; and finally So Long and Thanks for all the Fish.

The first of them is also the best of them. I felt that the third book was extremely weak and the only reason I enjoyed the fourth book as much as I did was because it is actually something of a love story, an unusual one to be sure, but a love story nonetheless. It has no real plot but to see Arthur Dent in love with a woman who matches him so well is quite enjoyable for me.

Now I've started the fifth novel in the trilogy, Mostly Harmless, written in 1992. I'm kind of wishing I hadn't. Though it seems to recapture much of the wonderful silliness of the first novel it also tends to pick up some of the irritating writing habits Adams developed in the middle books. Habits like hinting at where the book is going, then spending annoying series of pages avoiding getting there. It's cleverness that's kind of lost itself in itself. In other words, Adams indulges his own cleverness to no good effect.

Oh well. I'm already a third of the way through so it won't take long to finish. And I've got the anticipation of getting back to Harry Potter to push me along.

Tags: Merlin, New Brunswick, birding, Douglas Adams, Mostly Harmless

Autumn has descended in all its glory on Nota Bene. Even our backyard has joined the party, with fabulous leaves sparkling in the sunshine and any number of amazing birds paying visits on their way through.

Even though Norway Maples are not indigenous to NB and even though, on the advice of many people, I'm patiently cutting most of them out of our backyard property, you have to admit that they are pretty glorious when they turn colour. The first photo in this entry is of the leaves at the top of one such tree, bathed in the early morning sun, a splendid salad of reds and oranges and yellows. A beautiful sight!

And then, as I was admiring that sight, what do I hear but the raspy call of some kind of woodpecker. I waited, listened, then saw a fantastically huge Pileated Woodpecker swoop into the yard and land in one of the Aspens that grow tall and slim back there.

I was stunned by his sudden appearance and, for several long minutes, watched entranced as he made his way up and down the trunk of the tree. Then, carefully, I made my way into the house to get my camera, hoping, praying he'd stick around long enough for me to get a picture or two.

Thankfully, he didn't disappoint. In fact, he made himself available to my lens with better profiles than I could have dreamed. What a beautiful bird. I love the colour of his crown. I've added two photos of him to this page and a third on my "Feathers In Fredericton" page. So please do enjoy them all.

Later in the morning, a surprisingly blue nuthatch (a white-breast) appeared at our feeder but, unlike the woodpecker, he came and went so fast I couldn't get the camera in time. Still, a pretty great day for mid-October. Even more to be thankful for on Thanksgiving!

Tags: Fall, New Brunswick, Pileated, Woodpecker, birding

The family has arrived. With four guests in our house for the past five days and two more on the way to join us tomorrow, we've been having a fun, busy time. We had planned to go to the Hopewell Rocks on the Bay of Fundy today but the weather has gotten in the way. So it's a quiet day for catching up on sleep and nosing around Fredericton, I guess.

We went whale watching on Tuesday, down in St. Andrews by the Sea. This was my second experience with the whales and trip two was just as fantastic as trip one. Our first visit, we went out on the zodiac, which was very exciting. This time, we went out on the catamaran of Quoddy Link Marine, a more sedate trip but just as great. We saw lots of amazing things, including minke and finback whales close up (within 20 feet of the boat), harbour porpoises, harbour seals, grey seals and black guillemots. Really quite amazing.

Of course taking pictures of whales is not as easy as you might think, given their massive size. Sometimes, all you get is their spray but, at other times, you're lucky enough to get much of the back and the fin. We all had a blast on the trip and it might just happen that some of us go again when the other members of the family arrive.

Other adventures so far include bowling at Kingswood, the place where I play golf. We never did solve the mystery of the candlestick pins but had a lot of fun trying. We've wandered Fredericton and have plans to visit the beach at Mactaquac as well as Kings Landing at some point during the visit.

On a birding note, Patti came across a little fellow nestled in the grass under our dining room window. It would seem he knocked himself loopy by flying into the glass. We scooped him up to keep him safe from predators and then placed him in a box with food, water and some cedar leaves to give him time to recover. We're happy to report that the little guy enjoyed a brief stay in our bird hotel and then, his wits recovered, flew off into the world again. Nice to see a happy ending.

Now if I could only make a definite ID on the kind of bird he is. I know, pathetic that I can't figure it out with such a clear picture! If anyone out there can help me, I'd very much appreciate it. I've taken a quick look through my various books but I'm not getting anywhere. He's got a little yellow patch on his upper back, yellow on his chest and white patches on his wings. Otherwise, he seems to be black/grey/olive all over. And he's tiny, no more than four inches. Help!!!

Tags: Fredericton, birding, Bowling, Kingswood, whale, St. Andrews by the Sea, Fundy, Quoddy Link