The Long Run 9/23/12

September 23, and it was 36 degrees at wakeup. Oh, fall has a start this year, a good start. It was a novel feeling to wait for it to warm up enough to go out for my long Sunday run. I'd been anticipating it all week. And decided I had to bring my camera along. You'll understand why.

There are now a dozen cattle in the haymeadow, as there were last fall. I was elated when they were trucked over and let loose. They're all heifers, look like mostly Limousins, a couple of Hereford/Angus, with a lovely, very young black bull who could either be Angus or Limousin. Still thinking about him, but leaning toward Limousin.

I love having cows near because I find them fascinating and very beautiful, especially when backlit. 

Backlit cows' breath hangs

On silvergold morning air

Good thing light changes.

I'd stand here all day

rooted, ogling the beasts

Shaggy thick angels.

They give me someone to talk to. This is quite a spooky wild little bunch and I'm having fun gentling them, working with their natural curiosity to befriend them. 

Chet Baker likes having cows around, too.

He really wants to play with them. Truth told, he'd probably like to herd them a bit, or at least get them running so he can give chase. 

I love this shot. Hard to believe that tiny little live wire in the upper right quadrant is all that keeps us apart. Sometimes it doesn't work too well.

Cows, being herd animals, are often inspired to follow when you run ahead of them. I guess they figure you have a reason to run and they'd better get going, too. Last year's bunch ran with me until they got bored doing it. This bunch is very green and excitable, and they run alongside me whenever I go out.  Chet got pretty excited, too, when the cows took off and quick as lightning he slipped under the wire and frisked a little bit with them.  CHET CHET CHET GET OUTTA THERE!!

I saw him rear up on his hinders and jump at this boss cow. She responded by bogging her head and hooking his shoulder with her nose. It wasn't a full-on butt, but it wasn't nothing, either. She caught Chet on the shoulder and shoved him aside. At that point he decided to listen to me and come back under the tiny fine wire to the road. The ear position here says it all.

Hm. Those things are large. And strong, and harder than they look. Perhaps Mether is right about going under the wire.

If you would like, I can speak to your dog about coming in the pasture with my wimmen. 

Sorry, Sir. Will try to prevent such incidents going forward.

We forged onward, noting that the coons are eating persimmons already. See the seed that fell out of the dropping?  Must check under my trees to see if they've begun to fall. The fruit, that is. Not the coons.

We looked down the beautiful county road at Carl's house. I probably have 50 pictures of Carl's house in the morning. There are so few original Ohio farmhouses left.

There's always this wonderful moment when Chet realizes we're going on the 5-mile run and he gets to head out on the main road. He trots loose and fast and his hinders fly out side to side, he's so happy.

and so am I, because we get to live here and see things that take my breath away every day. Especially on a crystal pure September morning when it's still in the 30's in the shade.

Up at the top of the next hill and looking back where we started. It's all hills, more or less. Flats are welcome but all too rare. You're either going down or coming up.

Cow hair caught on the barbed wire, Chet investigating.

We get to live here and see this every day.

On Sunday mornings if you go out before church traffic, you won't meet a soul. May it always be that way.

I thought the pine shadows looked like palm trees. Oh and look. That one has arms and shorts.

Fergus' pond hoves into view. This is the little farm pond where I let my bird-eating bullfrog go many, many years ago. Story in Letters from Eden. 

It is the most beautiful of ponds. 

with a little cabin I would like to inhabit. All I would need is something to scribble on and a Honeycrisp apple. And Chet. I'd sit on the porch and write a book about my dog.

Wait. I'm already doing that.  More running anon. If I showed the whole route to you at once you'd curl up from the beauty.

Chet Baker's Booksigning

This is a post about my booksigning. Well, it was actually Mether's booksigning. But my job was to work the people.  We went to Sugden Book Store. Which is a very nice independent bookstore on Front Street in Marietta, Ohio. I got a little nervous because Dr. Lutz's office is nearby. But we drove right past there and wound up downtown! I only wear a collar when I am downtown. 

First, I watched for a person to walk into Sugden Book Store.

I stood on the book table so I could see better. Besides, that way I could show the people all the books.

Mether said I got little black hairs all over the tablecloth. But why would I stay on the floor? I had to be front and center.  I had a job to do.

 I must have been very good at my work because Angela guv me a cookie she had made that was shaped like a bluebird. Mether said No, not the whole cookie!! but it was too late. I got the whole cookie.

Which was too much for me as Mether had pointed out. So I jumped down and circled the bookstore several times with the cookie in my mouth  and finally took it to the far corner to bury it. I heard people commenting that there was no dirt. Well, that is not a problem. What you do, is you hide it.

And once you have hidden it, you scrape imaginary dirt over it with your nose. Many, many times. 

I do not know why this makes Mether laugh but she always does. It may be the oinking.

There. I have buried the cookie. No one would look under a broom.

I pretended not to care whether someone bought a book or not. But I did. 

I put my paws on their hands and stood up. Everyone seemed to like that. You have to get yourself up to their level so they do not have to stoop down.

Yes, of course I am a nice boy. That is my job. That, and selling books.

It took awhile between people coming in. I kept my eyes fixed on the door. I figured out quickly that not everyone who walks by comes in. 

Miss Angela had some dogs in the back of the store. The first thing I did was run up to them. I gave them a quick sniff and kept running past so no one would guess that I thought they were real for a little while. 

When the traffic slowed down I went back there again. I tried biting one of them on the ear.

He tipped over giving me a chance to smell under his belly. No. Not real at all.  No pee pee smell at all. So you cannot tell a thing about a dog like that, you cannot tell what he eats or even whether he is a boy or a girl. Fake.

I tried just a little shake.  Mether said CHET BAKER THOSE ARE FOR SALE THEY ARE NOT YOURS.

Which did not slow me down. But I was doing my soft bite, not my rippy bite. I just kind of mouth it when it is an article of clothing or a towel or a new fake dog I am not supposed to rip up. Mmmmf. Shake it up.

Roger came in and he loved on me. He also bought a book. As you can see I am in prime bookselling position here. Nobody told me to sit there. It just seemed like the thing to do.

Then it got quiet again.

I kept my eyes fixed on the door and the people outside. 

I got kind of bored. Miss Angela fetched me a paper plate she was going to throw like a Frisbee for me to catch and retrieve.

She does not know me very well. That plate had one flight in it. 

Mether explained about my fondness for pasteboard. It must be smithereened. 

People who came in and out of the door all asked if I would run out into the street. Well of course I would never do that. Mether was inside and she had told me I needed to stick around. Besides, I was working.

All in all Mether said it was an excellent dry run for when my book comes out. You know, the Chet Baker book. Mether is writing it right now. So I expect we will do this again.

She needs to hurry because I really want to do more signings. Even if I have to use an inkpad. Mether says she is going to get an inkpad made of my pawdyprint so I do not have to walk around printing the carpet with my inkedy paws. I am not too wild about pawtographing. The first two or three are not bad but when she lines up 20 or 30 it gets old fast. 

I will wear my best smile

and hope that all the people stop walking, turn and come in to the bookstore, wherever we go.

Indigo Buntings: Full Circle

Regular readers of this blog know that there is nothing, nothing, nothing that pleases me more than being able to tell the whole story. No matter how many days, weeks, months or years may come between the inception (Piper's arriving in April 2012, staking claim to the yard in July, singing on the farm bell, Mrs. Piper's building a nest on July 30, the incubation of her eggs and eventual hatch of two young on August 14, their growth and fledging on Day 10, August 24)...and the satisfying conclusion of the story. Sometimes you don't get that satisfying conclusion. Sometimes you luck out and you do. (I'm thinking of Shelly the box turtle, who came back a whole year later; I'm thinking of the gray tree frog eggs that finally became froglets; I'm thinking of the rose gentian that finally bloomed, two years later; I'm remembering Garrett the red-headed woodpecker and that magical winter (s)he spent with us...will she come back in 2012?)

 The trick is being there for it, watching for it, being ready for  the moment. So when Bill and I, doing some morning tower birding, spotted Mrs. Piper accompanied by two begging fledglings way out in the prairie patch in the sideyard, I went on high alert. Got a lot of photos of them as hopeless dark dots. It was September 9, 2012, and the babies, not seen since they were a rather reptilian 10 days old, would now be 26 days old. Ohhhh I wanted a photo of one of those little reptiles, transformed into a bird. But they wouldn't come any closer, and I was loath to break up the family breakfast by walking closer. Eventually it was time for me to head downstairs. Bill stayed up in the tower awhile longer. And shouted down, "ZICK! They've moved to the north border! Look in the sassafrases!"

And there were two newly minted indigo buntings. Oh my goodness. What a difference two weeks make.

I stood glued up against the trunk of my Japanese maple, hiding under its canopy, and shot as Mrs. Piper came in with a grasshopper. Oh glory be. 

Full circle.

As I write this, it's September 18. Yesterday morning, a male indigo bunting rose up out of the Pipers' prairie patch and gave a brief but indescribably sweet flight song, something I hadn't heard since late July, when Mrs. Piper was winding up to build her nest. It was early morning and the light was bad but I grabbed Bill's binoculars from his car and dashed around to get up-light of the bird. He'd landed in Piper's favorite cherry tree. Could it be Piper??

I didn't have my camera with me, but I was able to make out a bird with a blue head, brown back and chest, white belly, and blue wings and tail. Wow. If that's Piper, he's done some serious molting since I saw him last. 

As I stood amazed, Mrs. Piper and the two bairns flew up from the prairie patch to join the bird in  Piper's cherry. They chipped and talked and goofed around, flying little loops, for all the world like a family reunited. Holy cow. Talk about full circle! 

But it's never safe to assume. So I wrote my Molt Guru, Bob Mulvihill. 

Dear Bob, I'm launching in on a day-by-day photo story of the lives of the indigo buntings that nested in our yard. Want to ask your opinion on something. The male, Piper, who's featured in today's blogpost, made himself very scarce when his mate started incubation. I actually think he left the territory; he didn't come in for daily baths and didn't sing. I thought I might have seen him farther out the meadow. The two chicks fledged and are still being fed by the female in the yard and vicinity on Day 35, which is a bit of a surprise to me; hadn't thought they'd feed their fledglings quite that long after they left the nest. Now, yesterday morning, I saw and heard a male indigo give a flight song on Piper's territory, and land in "his" cherry. The female and young were with him. The light was terrible but I managed to maneuver uplight of him and he seemed to be a patchwork male, with brown on chest and back, some blue on wings and head. Would that be Piper? Do full adult males go into an eclipse molt and go back to brown for winter? 

Both babies are still completely in pale brown, so I know it wasn't one of them.  Thanks so much. JZ

Bob wrote me right back: 

Yes, Piper would almost certainly be starting his prebasic molt by now, replacing his bright blue "alternate" or breeding plumage with brown "basic" or winter plumage.  And, he likely will get browner day-by-day.  But, he will still have some nice blue highlights here and there even when his prebasic (= post-breeding) molt is finished.  I'll send you a couple of pics if I can find some for comparison.

Best,

Bob

This bird was photographed on October 2, 2003, at Powdermill Banding Station in western Pennsylvania. 

For a glimpse of just what cool stuff Bob gets to see and share, check this link to Powdermill's website. 

An earlier stage of molt, the brown basic plumage just starting to come in. I saw streaks of brown running down Piper's blue breast.

And that top photo of the brown, blue-winged male bunting is pretty much exactly what Piper looked like. To see him there reunited with his mate and two offspring, well, that was a fine moment. As I write, on September 18, she's still feeding them on Day 35. Bits and pieces, put together. That's how you get a picture of a bird. 

Thanks to Bob Mulvihill, whose email signature includes this:

"It's nice to be important, but it's more important to be nice."

--sign over the work table of a man named Jeno, who was a master cabinet maker at Boswell Lumber in Somerset Co., PA in the 1970s, and who unfailingly dropped whatever he was doing to help a young boy turn rough drawings of his latest idea for a custom bird feeder or nest box into well-fitting pieces that could be assembled into the real thing!