Bye Bye Blackbirds

                                                   Mother Blackbird ( Birdie )
 Introducing my resident Blackbird family if you haven't met them before on my blog .
That's Birdie up on top , She's been here for many years and this year strangely lost her feathers on her head and hurt one of her feet , we think maybe she got caught by a cat , but  she got away and is just fine apart from that .
I didn't think she'd find a birdy boy to love her , but she did ! And they had two beautiful babies .

I have really enjoyed watching her little family and because she trusts me , she allowed me to get close to take photographs .

                          Here's the Papa Blackbird..he is a very handsome boy !

They have hopped about where ever I am in the garden , sometimes they come to my kitchen for grapes , but while digging I have thrown slugs , snails and they dive in and pull out grubs and other insects ....I made sure the bird baths were full and they had plenty of fresh water to drink .

 We have a pile of old decomposing woodchips and rotting logs , during the heatwave I forked it over so that they could find food to feed the young fledglings .

                                                   Plenty of food in there !

                      I turned over one of the rotting logs to reveal a large ants nest !

 The eggs were huge and Birdie danced about trying to avoid being stung by the ants , whilst grabbing those fat ant eggs .

Later on I noticed that each of the parent birds took charge of one each of the fledglings .

         I can already see that one of the fledglings is much darker than the other .

 This photo shows it better . You can already see that one is a male and the other a female .

                                        Plenty of fruit about now in the bushes .

 But alas ! Since this last weekend they have all disappeared .End of July . This is the time that they keep hidden while they are moult and grow new feathers . They are still there , just keeping a very , very low profile down under bushes ..especially while that Sparrow Hawk is hanging around!

                                                         Sparrow Hawk

I do hope that Birdie gets some new feathers on her head ! She deserves a rest now after all her hard work raising those two hungry babies .

 Hey ! I told you that the sun would come out !  Have a happy and blessed Sunday  .

Maybe tomorrow .....

                                    Yep ! ..it's another Gete -okosomin update !
           We,ve had a few rain showers and it has made such a difference . Well maybe not the sweetcorn , but the kale , Cherokee Purple tomatoes , Gete -okosomin Squash and a few nicotiana plants are all really doing well .
We had a problem in that the squash was only producing female flowers ..and then a few male flowers appeared..but seemed very reluctant to open their petals .

                       Female Gete-okosomin Squash flower bud with immature fruit .
               
This evening I ventured out into a warm , foggy Mullion evening , typical for this time of the year , and found that we have two female buds and one male about ready to open . I think maybe tomorrow morning .

                                       Male Gete-okosomin Squash flower bud .

There is another female flower which I tied with soft twine to prevent the bees getting in to it .

 Here is the female flower tied with soft  twine ...hopefully I will be able to pollinate these two female flowers tomorrow .....and breathe a big sigh of relief !
Anyway, other news , keep an eye  out for the Sparrow Hawk flying around our way in Mullion , at the moment . At least ..I think it is a Sparrow Hawk..please let me know if you think it is something else , I,m not an expert and would love to know for sure .
 I began taking photos from the kitchen window after my husband called me "Quickly come and see this !"
I took a couple of  photos indoors , then , quietly ...managed to sneak out side and get surprisingly close to it .

    My heart pounding  all the while..it turned and looked at me and flew away !

Poor pigeon ..he was still alive ! He flew into the bushes and I just left him there to hopefully recover from his terrifying ordeal . I needed a cup of tea after that too !

 More rain coming our way tonight , will make the job of weeding easier tomorrow .