August 29th  2011    Tim Candler

    Chickadees dominating the garden this morning.  The ones with the black cap. I counted three young, for certain, and one proud parent instructing the children not to eat Hoppy Bug, which is a shame because of those insects in the garden Hoppy Bug are the most plentiful.

    A Hoppy Bug loves the leaf of Eggplant and takes great care to mottle it in a most organic manner. I have to imagine this practice is a deliberate attempt to camouflage the damage they do. So opposite to the grubs of Colorado Beetle who are absolutely blatant and unashamed in their feeding.

     I did my best to suggest to the new Chickadees that Hoppy Bug, while perhaps a little bitter on the tongue and perhaps a little difficult to catch, were indeed a well balanced food source, chock full of those elements  a young Chickadee needs to grow his feathers and fight off flu.

      But generally when a person talks to birds, they increasingly treat him like a mental patient and after a while they ignore him altogether. And this is especially the case when there must be something like ice cream in the Sunflowers, because a Carolina Wren has posted guard and no one is allowed near.

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