I took my camera (Fujifilm FinePix A607) outside this evening to try to get a photo of our resident blue wren. It taunted me by flitting about by the back door. I forgot the dog would rush out the doggie-door if she thought I intended to go out, so missed out.

I wandered up the backyard to see what I could see. The sun sets on the right when I’m down the back. Nothing spectacular about this image, unless you count the sheep.

looking over my right side fence

looking over my left side fence

We don’t actually have a back fence, since the side ones complete our triangular plot. I love the way the sunlight flings about over my left fence. The highway is on the other side of those gum trees lining the paddock.

I had some bad news a few days ago. My mum rang and told me my brother had died on the 15th. She rang after the funeral (27th) so I had no option of going. I’m a bit annoyed as she could have rang me as soon as she found out the day before. Bernie was 53, having dialysis a few times a week. His heart gave out. He is the one who had schizophrenia. My sister Carol was 53 when she died, too. Mum has four kids left now.

To-day, we went to Ballarat to watch a grandson play junior football. They won by a point right before the final siren. Straight into the grand-final in two weeks. I really enjoyed the four-hour round trip – the scenery was amazing. Sorry I didn’t stop and take photos. I should have!

Thanks for dropping by and I hope you all have a good week.  🙂

It is getting warm enough, apparently, for bees to think about foraging. I spotted this bee in the wattle tree down by the footbridge. Not a very colourful bee, but a bee none-the-less.

Taken on the Nokia Lumia 520, cropped and reduced in size.

This next photo was taken out my window this morning with the same camera.

I’m off to work now. Thanks for looking, and please have a good day.  🙂

This morning, during our walk, I saw a blue-faced honeyeater. Just the one, though there must have been others in the gum blossoms. It was too gloomy to see properly in the leaf canopy. It’s my first sighting of this bird and, at first, I thought it was a blue jay. I said the light was bad.

Wikipedia says, in part …

The blue-faced honeyeater (Entomyzon cyanotis), also colloquially known as the bananabird, is a passerine bird of the honeyeater family Meliphagidae. …

At around 29.5 cm (11.6 in) in length, the blue-faced species is large for a honeyeater. … Males and females are similar in external appearance. Adults have a blue area of bare skin on each side of the face readily distinguishing them from juveniles, which have yellow or green patches of bare skin.

Here is a photo from Wikimedia Commons.

By Quartl (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Found in open woodland, parks, pubs, and gardens, the blue-faced honeyeater is common in northern and eastern Australia and southern New Guinea. … Its diet is mostly composed of invertebrates, supplemented with nectar and fruit. They often take over and renovate old babblernests, in which the female lays and incubates two or rarely three eggs. …

The blue-faced honeyeater was first described by ornithologist John Latham in his 1802 work Supplementum Indicis Ornithologici, sive Systematis Ornithologiae. However, he described it as three separate species, seemingly not knowing it was the same bird in each case: The blue-eared grackle… the blue-cheeked bee-eater …, and as the blue-cheeked thrush…

Rapt to see a new bird, I could hardly wait to get home to find a name for it, as I didn’t have a clue. I think where I live must be on the southern-most edge of their habitat. I’m surprised I haven’t noticed them while camping by the Murray River, north from here, on our border with New South Wales.

I’ve just visited the Birds In Backyards website, reading up on which native plants are best for planting with my local birds in mind. I reckon I can find places for at least 10 shrubs, maybe more. I’ll let you know.

Okay, that’s it for me on the web, for now. I must get back to this writing lark.

Have a good day. Thanks for reading.  🙂