Injured Bluebird, Missing Lambs and a Crazy Sparrow

A crazy song sparrow is into it's 4th day of courting his image in my windows. I feel sorry for the poor bird as he files from one window to another and we have many of them. And speaking of birds, on my way home from somewhere, I noticed a bluebird on the ground by the gazebo. Ok, no big deal, except he was still there hours later when I was on my way to somewhere else. When I got back home I got out of the car and sure enough he couldn't fly away. Tom and I managed to catch him and put him in a cage that we have.

I noticed that he had an injury to his wing but it didn't look serious. Then I called my friend down the road who is a certified wildlife rehabilitator and she told me what to do. I had some dried blueberries which he loved and I gave him a dish of water. The next morning there was no improvement so I took him to my friend's. The next morning I saw her get out of her truck with an empty cage. He didn't make it. So his mate is around here somewhere pining away. In other bird news there was a breeding pair of Common Merganzers on the pond this morning. Such wonderful ducks! I always delight in seeing them. I took no pictures as I did not want to scare them away.

Then that morning when I went to let out the sheep into the barnyard I noticed the group was a little light on lambs. Hmmm... I thought that perhaps some were asleep in the creep area. Nope, no lambs. No lambs in the main pen. Where the heck were they? Now I have to back up a little. Last week we went out to diner and I was nervous about leaving the then tiny lambs out in the barnyard without anyone being home to check on them. I had visions of owls or hawks swooping down on them. So the kids took full advantage of this at dinner and teased me about it. So when the lambs went missing this weekend I had visions of flailing legs high up in the sky! I again went to the main pen and this time I went in.... and sure enough there were three lambs huddled closely up against the aisle wall and they were sound alseep. I didn't see them because they were so tightly grouped against that wall. How they slept through the bluster of sheep stampeding from the pen to the barnyard I will never know, but needless to say my heart got quite a workout.

I will leave you with this very cute photo of one lamb being resourceful at keeping the draft from his nose. As always click to enlarge the cuteness.