Lots of blackbirds and grackles are arriving and we have seen several robins. The geese are also about and the flock we have in the woods at the back of us have arrived and are honking happily. We have also had quite a few redpolls, pic below.

Chipmunks are up and about and frantically running around the garden and we still have the deer most days, but I’m sure their visits will be ending soon. But the raccoons are out and about. They are cute but a nuisance.

We are still waiting for the arrival of the killdeer who have come back every year we have been here to nest and raise their young. They usually arrive during the last two weeks of March so we expect them any time soon.

The junkos will be leaving us soon, no doubt. But it definitely feels more like spring now.

On another note I have decided against eye surgery at this time. The $4k price tag is too high to justify at the moment. I will readdress the issue sometime in the future perhaps.

Also daughter Stacey and girlfriend Amy will be visiting from the UK in May, so we are really looking forward to that. Planning lots of trips and adventures, so I don’t think our feet will touch the ground whilst they are here.

Last year the pair had four babies but they got killed by another killdeer that turned up unexpectedly, so we only had babies for a short while. Hopefully they will do better this year – perhaps the parents have bought baby sitters with them to help LOL. It will be interesting to watch the dynamics as they next and have young.

Other birds that have now arrived include robins and a possible sighting of the flicker, still to be confirmed. The raccoons are about as are the chipmunks and of course the squirrels are always about regardless of the weather. Since we haven’t had any major bad weather the deer are not about as much as they have been in the past which is a shame.

Talking of the weather  - it is all over the place lately. We really haven’t had a winter this year, just a few days of snow here and there and some cold days (including today), but on the whole nothing compared to the previous years we have been here. The weekend looks to be cold and rainy, but next week is looking warmer and sunny.

Us old fogies stayed in for the evening whilst they went out clubbing. However we found out in the morning that they could not find the clubs they were looking for and ended up coming back to the hotel quite early and watched TV.

On the second day in Ottawa the girls went on their own way and needless to say they went shopping! I just fail to see how anyone can shop for hours and hours. We left them at about 10.30 am and met up with them again at 6pm – and they were still shopping!

Sunday we went into Belleville so they could – yes – do more shopping! Lots of peanut butter M&M’s later (apparently you cannot get them in the Uk we went home. Spent the rest of the day relaxing as we had an early start on Monday to get to the airport for their early morning flight.

We got up at 4am and there was a raccoon in the garden so we quickly called the girls who were starting to stir to come see. Even though we see the damn things in the garden most evenings since they arrived not one had visited – typical. So not they had seen raccoons and groundhogs!

We checked them into their flight online which allowed us some extra time to get to the airport. The drive there is normally a maximum of 2 hours and we allowed 3.5 hours, however due to horrendous delays with traffic in Toronto where we hardly moved for over an hour we managed to miss the flight. Now we have travelled all over the world on both business and pleasure and have never ever missed a flight. When we got to checkin the woman told us that “You have missed it by 17 minutes, go over there and buy new flight” charming!

We went “over there” and were told that the tickets they had purchased were not transferrable and they would have to buy new ones. At that point there were lots of tears from fed up daughter and I think the booking clerk felt sorry for her and agreed to rebook them for a smaller fee of $100 each which I paid on our credit card. The trouble was this was 8am and the flight wasn’t until 11.25 pm.

We had to decide whether to go home and come back again later but the girls said they would stay at the airport and wait. They had charged their PSP up so would play games and wander round. We stayed with them for an hour or so and then made our way back home after lots of hugs and tears.

We finally heard back from them today and they arrived home okay but have colds – a result of airline air no doubt.

From the time their original flights with Zoom were cancelled due to going into receivership to the very end it was a flight nightmare. Good job all the bits in the middle went well to make up for it!

Then on Wednesday we had hurricane force winds battering the area. Lots of people were without power and many trees etc were torn down. Fortunately we did not loose power, although our neighbor lost the siding off his house as it went billowing across our front garden.

By Thursday the wind had died down and the temperatures have gone down to around +5C which is still much above the normal of -2C for this time of year. The forecast is for the temps to drop further to more normal levels and for some more snow next week. And I though the UK had strange weather!

You can tell the temps are up as last night we had four raccoons in the garden. This is the first time we have seen them since the beginning of December. We felt a little cruel chasing them off as the poor things had only just woken up and hadn’t eaten for weeks, but you cannot let them win otherwise you just cannot get rid of them.

The deer has also been around most nights. We think we have over 20 individuals in the area as we have different groups visit us at different times of the evening. They are quite amusing as they look up at us as we watch them and then just carry on eating. They can be frightened by a leaf blowing in the wind but they don’t seem bothered by us gawking at them.

The bathroom, laundry room and hallway are all finished now and it looks great. We redecorated the hallway which had been disturbed by the renovations and of course now that makes other rooms look in need of a make over. Because we are open plan it shows up even more, even though we have decorated everywhere since we moved in 18 months ago. Oh well, I see another project coming on….

He was quite a bit chunkier than the does with a big thick set neck and of course antlers. I don’t think is a particularly old stag as his antlers were not huge, but then size isn’t everything!

In the pics below you can see the stag and the dark blob on the ground is Ronnie our resident raccoon who stood his ground against the stag.

This has also meant that we have switched from air conditioning to heating, so getting the guy out next week to service the furnace etc just to make sure it is all ok for the winter.

Our single deer has been back most nights since our sighting last week. She wanders over around 9pm and stays for about half an hour, or until the food runs out and then wanders off again. She has the most beautiful big ears that are like radars, whizzing round at the slightest noise. The night before last she had a standoff with Ronnie the raccoon.

The deer had been feeding for some time and she suddenly stopped and kept staring into the woods with her ears going mad and her tail twitching, a sure sign of anxiety. After a few minutes out trotted Ronnie who casually walked over to the tree and started eating the food on the floor. The deer stood back for a few minutes watching, then seemed to decide it was her food and walked over and started eating too. Ronnie scuttled up the tree and they were eye to eye with each other. After a few minutes of head nods from the deer and punches from Ronnie the deer wandered off leaving Ronnie to this food. Chris then went out and chased off Ronnie. We did not want to do this whilst the deer was here as we didn’t want to scare her.

On another exiting note, I have finally used my new iron and board and I am please to say both work. The iron is great and made me realise how bad the other one really was!

We had to have our truck serviced on Friday and the bill was extortionate – $45. Honesty I don’t think a garage in the UK would even look at a car for that sort of money let alone service it. I know it was one of the smaller services (30,000km) but still.

It is really hot here at the moment and has been for several weeks. We had a few cooler days (low 20’sC) last week but mainly it has been in the high 20’s. Today we got 34C which is really too hot and the weather man suggested with the humidex it felt like the low 40’s which I can well believe. The heat is even wearing the squirrels out and they can be found flaked out in the trees and on the seed boxes, they are so funny.

We have been successfully keeping the growing number of raccoons at bay. So far we have noted two different mothers with five babies each and another with three. They are totally adorable, but they keep coming out in the day and they literally take over the feeding stations in the garden, which means the squirrels, and chipmunks are frightened off. Hubby has devised a plan that involves using the hosepipe to flush them out of the garden. For some reason they are quite happy to sit out in the rain and eat, but don’t like to be hosed. We don’t care if they come around at night and finish off the leftover food, but to steal it from our “regulars” during the day is just not on.

We found evidence of raccoons on the deck (in the form of poo), so suspect that they are to blame. Not only do they have the audacity to eat our chicks then then s*** in our deck!

On a lighter note the baby raccoons (I know, ironic isn’t it) came back last night with mum and we took some more photos of them. They are a menace, but so, so cute.

Chris put the nest back under the deck where it had been, but the two remaining babies looked badly shaken and were not making a sound.

Dad is around and keeps bringing them worms, the trouble was he seems to have no idea where they are. He was calling for them, but they were in such a bad state they were not replying. He was just wandering round the garden with worms hanging out of his beak.

Later in the afternoon the chicks seemed to have picked up a little and were calling out, but dad has not been around, and of course mum is dead, so we hope that they survive and dad looks after them.

Just when things were looking bleak, at about three this afternoon Ronnie the raccoon turned up with her babies, the first time we had seen them. She has five of them. No wonder she was coming round early in the evening to feed.

Here are some pics, aren’t they just adorable.

When they had spend half an hour eating and playing in the tree, they all flaked out.

Even mum

We seem to have lots of animals and birds with young at the moment: squirrels, rabbits and raccoons.

Talking of babies, our mother robin nesting under our deck now has four chicks. The eggs hatched successfully and they are just little bags of skin and bones at the moment.

The weather here has been very warm lately, but we have been suffering with smog coming over from the US. So although it has been in the high 20’s the sun has not been getting through too often and the sky is very murky. Rained all day yesterday and forecast today too.