Bird-feeder royalty
January 23, 2020
Pushing and shoving, dive-bombing, squabbling, jockeying and butting-in, the bird-feeder etiquette of our variety of finches is the birdy equivalent of an episode of ‘Survivor’. There’s also gender bias going on. Early morning, when the very first flock gingerly descends from the upper branches, nervously eyeing the freshly-filled feeders, the males timid over whether it’s safe to go for it or not, hold back. Waking up as finches, the males suddenly decide they’d rather be chicken. So, it’s up to their female partners to make the first attempt. Only then, do the males feel emboldened.
And then, there’s the the Dark-eyed Junco: royalty of bird-feeder land. Shy, yet able to hold their own, Juncos forego the unseemly behaviour going on above, and instead head for the ground underneath. Gathering in polite groups, they snatch up the morsels the more greedy finch riff-raff above them can’t quite manage to gorge fast enough.
watercolour, 3″ x 5″, Arches Hot Press #140 Paper
by Lance Weisser
A bit of New York
January 4, 2012
I was raised in Rochester, New York, and then later on the New York / Vermont border. At some point we had occasion to visit the town of Saranac Lake, New York, which hosted the 1980 Winter Olympics and much earlier in its history was one of North America’s best known tuberculosis sanatorium locales. Patients went there to receive plenty of sunshine and fresh air.
Kamloops, British Columbia, my present home, was also chosen as a prime location for a TB sanatorium and it was located just outside the city limits at Tranquille, B. C., beside Kamloops Lake. The air here is dry, without even a hint of humidity in the Summer and bracingly-cold in the Winter.
I loved staying in Saranac Lake that one week in January. The lake itself was completely frozen over, with a fresh layer of snow and a blindingly-bright sun.
'A Frosty Saranac Lake, Saranac Lake, New York, c1989'
weisserwatercolours 