May 2022 begins with rain...

 April showers bring May flowers...  what does May rain bring? 

We have only had one Sandhill Crane at time show up for corn since April 30th.  We must have eggs!  Momma is a bit skittish without Pappy by her side but she comes twice a day for some corn.  He is more aggressive and will come to the lake side of the house and call out to Eric for some corn!  Well maybe not but maybe...  

May 4: first Hummingbird of the season came by for a drink. A Purple Martin scouted out the new house! Hopefully he brings his friends!  fingers crossed..  

Found a pair of rabbit legs hanging in a tree on the driveway!  Theories are some kind of raptor or owl was eating it above when it fell onto the tree.  too weird..  

Yellow Bellied Sapsucker

May 6: new washer and dryer was installed!  the old set was on its last legs since last year.   they are so much bigger than than the 20 year old machines.  It was way past time for them to be replaced.

May 8 Mothers Day: 4 male Orioles came to feed along with at least 12 Rose Breasted Grosbeaks.  Cool overcast day = Sauna

May 9:  high winds today means trees falling where they should not...

 

We like to spend so much time outside that we finally set up a TV in the Wood Shed! 

Summer is here for a few days anyway.  Crazy migration brought 21 year birds to our yard between May 10-12!  they were everywhere, singing and flitting around.  Our heads were blowing up trying to figure out who they were!  

Friday May 13, a bit later than usual but we got the pontoon in the water.

It was pretty windy and of course it was blowing the wrong way!  but Eric managed to manhandle into position.  We are waiting for the dock people to come put the docks in the water, hopefully next week.

It was a bit windy to take the pontoon out, not really we were just lazy.  We were sitting on the pontoon looking at all the warblers jumping and flitting around when a big gust of wind took Eric's hat off of his head and dropped it into the lake!  

2 Sandhill Cranes have been coming to the yard for the last two days.  Not sure if they are "ours" or another couple.  It is discerning if they are ours as that would mean they lost the eggs.  Its only been 15 days since they started sitting on them and they need 28-32 days to incubate.  Hmmm..  another mystery we need to work on.  Sometimes there is just too much to do in a day!

Saturday May 14: Oh yes spring has sprung, the leaves have budded out, the flowers are blooming and the grass is growing!  Our neighbors Rick and Rita came by for a visit by the fire pit.  We had a fun time catching up with them. 

the Pear and Plum trees are full of blossoms.  

We heard of No Mow May but....

1st mowing of the season!

Sunday May 15: We took the pontoon out for a ride around the lake, the wind was blowing pretty hard and we had a few raindrops. The warblers are still migrating along with a few others.  We had a visitor Sunday just before bedtime

My picture is with my phone from the dining room window

Eric's picture is from the driveway with a camera!  Grumpy Bear did not want his picture taken.

good news: our Sandhill Cranes were doing their mating dance on Monday night!  Maybe we will have babies sometime in June?  The same thing happened last year where they lost the first eggs.  Keeping an eye on these two... Update only one crane coming to eat as of May 24...

yard Birds:

Eastern Bluebird

American Redstart

Canada Warbler

Magnolia Warbler

American Goldfinch

Poppy Crane

Indigo Bunting

Swainsons Thrush

Mourning Warbler

BayBreasted Warbler

Blackburnian Warbler

Black Pol Warbler

Philadelphia Vireo

Yellow Warbler

Palm Warbler 

Wilson's Warbler

Scarlet Tanager

Thurs May 19: we headed up to Ashland for 2 nights to catch the bird migration.  We did not want to participate in the birding festival, but wanted to catch some migrating birds.  We did pretty good today.  We also tried to catch a few night birds, owls and a rail in Grandview.  We left the hotel around 8 pm, no luck with any of our target birds.  The weather was a bit cool, windy and some rain/mist. We stayed at the Best Western, the same place we stayed before.  Unfortunately it was too cold to eat outside so we ended up going to the Super 1 for dinner.

Fri: began with rain.... but it turned out to be a lovely day.  the sun came out and warmed us up a bit.  We headed to Bark Bay on the north west side of the peninsula. Lots and lots of birds migrating. We avoided the "groups" as much as possible.  We stopped at Patsy's for dinner to go: Whitefish dinner and Firecracker Shrimp Tacos to eat in our room.  too cold to eat outside. 

Sat: our final day, we headed towards Superior Wi to go to Wisconsin Point.  On the way we stopped at a few places for walks and of course birds.  We ended the trip with 12 new year birds!  we were not expecting that many but also missed a few that we hoped to get.  Oh well, it was a great 3 days of walking, birding and avoiding people!

Migration has slowed down a bit but we are still getting warblers passing by along with a few new migrants. 

May 27: Oh we are getting excited...  we had a Purple Martin checking out the house this morning.  Hope he brings his friends for the summer.  I have read that they are still on their way north so we are hoping...  First real ride in the pontoon too.  Beautiful afternoon for a trip around Upper Long Lake. 

May 29: We found some Bear Paw Prints on our walk today!  Did not find the bear...

After about 6 weeks we finally finished the Puzzle! It was actually a bit earlier than usual but we had a lot more cold rainy days than usual for April and May, thus more inside time!

Crazy weather for our holiday weekend. We were not able to get out on the pontoon.  We did have hours of sunshine but rain was never far off and the wind was a bit strong. 

The trees have filled out, the flowers are blooming, the gardens are growing strong and we are expecting to see baby birds and mammals soon.  we are still only seeing one Crane at a time, so hopefully we will see baby cranes next month.  While driving into town we did see one fawn.  We think our deer have given birth, just hasn't brought the fawns out to eat corn.  49 new year birds this month!