While I was in California weekend before last, a Baikal Teal showed up in Portland for a single day. I missed that bird, but I did see this exceptionally rare specimen in Palo Alto....

Depending on your avg last frost date, it might be time to start some seeds. I suggest making a calendar from your frost dates & planting instructions for what you're growing this year (e.g. “start indoors 4 weeks before last frost” or “transplant outdoors after the threat of frost has passed”).

Making dirt from scratch (composting, soil building, and the like) is about as rewarding for me as eating the stuff I grow. I am as likely to show people pics of my huge trash cans of hella killer kickass dirt I made myself from garbage as I am of my plants. I look forward to spring siftin’ time.

Poor Lesser Goldfinch, just hoping for the slightest chance of a turn.

The other birds just sort of sat around the fringes of the yard looking forlorn for weeks until things calmed the heck down.

They descend like a plague of locusts.

When I went to the Backyard Bird Shop to buy more seed, the person there said they hadn't had any in their yard yet, but they'd seen a video. They described it as chaotic, looked a bit grossed out and said, "They're almost more like... insects...."

There has never been so much drama in my yard during FeederWatch than during the recent Pine Siskin irruption.

the other day I noticed that due to their tininess, the wikipedia article can't help but veer away from encyclopedic tone a bit

this is the face of someone whose flock pooped on me

my favorite color

I always read the label. I reported this patagial tag to the Bird Banding Laboratory so hopefully I'll hear back with a little bit of this bird's history.

Every year I do a Christmas card for the Gryphon's Guild card exchange. Everyone will have received their cards by now, so here's the art from 2023's card. I also send the same card to family and friends. I expect many find the yearly gryphons inexplicable. (Some don't even know what gryphons are.)