We Have Purple Martins!

Only took six years, but we have a pair of martins!

They are having trouble deciding which house they want!

If these two stay, eventually we will have all the houses full and will have to add more gourds like we did in Georgia.

The chickadee and chicks have left, so I removed the nest from the box.  Good to see my dogs' fur is recycled.  There's also some fur from an unidentified animal.

A memory appeared on my Facebook page of the photos I took of the grosbeaks last year.  They came on the exact same day this year!

At the feeders:  

In the gardens:

This is Shahab's backyard in Asheville.  We are invited up this weekend to see the poppies.  I hope a Persian meal comes with!!

My friend Dixie in Atlanta is an accomplished oil artist, and this painting of poppies was given to me years ago.  I am thinking of commissioning another for Shahab and Mindy for Christmas.

In Rescue:  Last week was a bad week.  I counted on others to save a chow in LA not knowing he may have been hit by a car.  He laid there six days in urine and feces, the vet thinks of a broken hip.  The people who were in charge dropped the ball, so I called the shelter to get things going. Found a vet tech to get him out to a vet and in the meantime raised $2000 in four hours.  He died when they anesthetized him for xrays.  So sad, I can't even post his photo.  I named him Survivor before his passing.  My first loss.  This week we saved Carla who had been in a shelter in NC for 10 months!  My friend Misha picked her up to foster her.

Here she is pouting for a drive thru cheeseburger LOL!

 Such a sweet girl saved in honor of Survivor.