Birds of spring

After a winter of feeding birds, I find that I'm paying more attention to all things bird these days. This bird house traffic circle has been in my area for years, but it's especially beautiful when the cherry trees in the background are all in blossom..

A closer look at the pole of bird houses.

This isn't much of a bird house, but some bird built a nest in a plant pot under this plastic saucer on shelves outside our garage. 

A look inside the pot; unfortunately, the birds abandoned the eggs in the nest after it was disturbed.

Now that the snow is gone and worms are plentiful, I've cut back my bird-feeding stations to one metal mesh container of suet. There aren't as many birds fluttering around the back yard as when I was offering them -- and the squirrels -- open pans of birdseed, but they're still very much part of the picture.

During a recent cleanup of plastic plant pots stashed outside the garage, John was startled when a bird flew out of a pot. In it, he found a nest, nicely feathered, with pale eggs the size of a thumbnail. He tried to leave it untouched, but unfortunately, the birds haven't returned, so those are eggs that will never hatch into a songbird for our back yard.

Then my friend Linda found a new book about birds that she couldn't stop talking about. Called Birds Art Life by Kyo Maclear, it's about a writer who finds creativity and meaning by learning how to see -- really see -- birds in the city. I haven't read the book yet, but love the idea that Maclear is not travelling to exotic places to fill out a lifetime bird list. Instead, she's making use of the everyday city around her to learn new things about nature -- and herself.

I plan to read Maclear's book, but I think I may have already started travelling along her path.

A bird condo? I came across this multi-holed construction near Main Street.

A pretty bird house on a pole near Arbutus.