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2001: NOW we can truly say this is the Third Millennium. But everybody is already partyed out because whatever energy they had left over from the 1999-2000 bash was used up for the lesser party of 2000-2001. Now we all just continue with life and forget about that until the eve of the 22nd Century. Who knows? Perhaps these web pages will still be around to address that abstract issue of time keeping by then. Perhaps not. It doesn't matter. What matters is the event of NOW. And NOW, the present moment, encompasses the past and future simultaneously. Time is just an illusion that we constructed to try to sort things out. Dualities are another illusion that we created for the same purpose. It's all been humankind's grand experiment. But now let's look in on the experiment these web pages are all about.
What's this? The Birdie Sanctuary looks different now. Gone is the sleek, tightly-woven look of 2000. Read on and discover why.
Sunflowers is why. In early 2001, Austin saw some pretty good rainfall. It's been recorded here that I put an extra dose of Sunflower seeds in the feeder. Well, some of those are eaten at the feeder perches. Some of them fall into the circle of sticks. And some of them are taken to the bird bath by the smarter birds (the Grackels and the Blue Jays) to be softened up for consumption. Still others are carried by the smaller birds to the bushes in the chain link fence, only to be dropped when they can't crack the shells.
With the extra rain fall, come Spring, Sunflowers started sprouting up everywhere; in the circle, around the circle, around the bird bath and near the chain link fence.
In addition to that turn of events, I decided to quit making the circle of sticks higher and higher. Remember the large stick that I had poked into the plastic jug just above the bird feeder? The one that acted as a "waiting" perch? Well, one very smart squirrel discovered a way to swing it around so he or she could climb onto it and start chewing holes in the feeder jug again. I replaced it with a stick which wouldn't support a squirrel's weight. But seeing how clever these little critters could be made me realize that if I built the circle of sticks too high, they would be able to jump from them to the feeder.
Then, I wanted to provide more perches for the birdies, too. So, instead of weaving more sticks into the circle, I used the circle stack to support sticks that went up vertically; more or less. That provided more perches.
Sticks coming out from the stack also provided a barrier of sorts to the neighborhood cats. Where before, the cats would sneak up to the circle then jump into it's center to pounce on the birdies feeding at the base of the tree inside, they couldn't do that without encountering the vertical sticks now poking out on the top rim of the circle.
That kitty encounter with the sticks delayed the pounce routine and made enough noise so that the birdies had a better chance of escaping.
As can be seen from these photos on the left and right, these "volunteer" Sunflowers grew to a pretty good size. They lasted for a month or two before the squirrels discovered how yummy the blossoms tasted.
The circle of sticks is on the east side of the tree. These Sunflowers grew fastest on the west side of the tree, but they actually grew up all around it. On the south side of the tree, I provided for additional birdie perch space by using the newly fallen sticks in a teepee kind of construction into which I still add such branches.
In this shot, one gets a better view of the teepee construction of sticks. When I mow the yard in the summer months, I simply go around all this and don't attempt to mow under the sticks. This makes a small pocket of more wild natural growth; I don't even try to weed it.
Late last year, I also transplanted planted some native Honeysuckle to this little oasis of wildlife in my back yard. I figured "Hey, all these sticks; they would look better with something growing on them." I got the Honeysuckle from Eileen's place on the north shores of Lake Travis near the small hill country town of Volente.
Of course, the Honeysuckle doesn't show in any of these shots. It's just a small, tiny vine next to the bird bath. But I thought I'd mention it here as a reference point for future pages which might be showing more vine coverage.
