Whatever the weather, bees are buzzin'

While it's just past the vernal equinox, and we now will have more daylight than night, it is still, in this hemisphere anyway, March - not supposed to be like summer. But you'd never know it from the activity I saw outside my front door at the boxwood this afternoon. Yesterday too.

Thought you might enjoy the video - truly short and for the bees - sweet, of these industrious insects busy gathering nectar from the tiny blossoms on the boxwood. For those of you interested in having a similar experience next year, when you trim your boxwood - and it seems most people do - do it immediately after it has bloomed, but allow it to get a bit raggedy and set bud blossoms in the fall. If you keep it neat and tidy - it won't bloom. But each to his own.

As you might imagine if you've followed this blog for any time at all, I love all things natural and encourage a rich complex of plants, bird life, and animals on my wee property. My four-legged family doesn't encourage the mice and moles, nor the frogs, but some manage to avoid my pals, since I see there holes everywhere in the pasture. And there are snakes (even a huge fox snake somewhere, though I haven't seen it in a couple of years, probably under the driveshed's crumbling foundation). But this property is a bit of nature growing as it will, except for my veggie and flower gardens and the very small patches of short grass that bluebirds need to find food.

I spotted a pair of swallows this morning who appear to have selected their nest box already, and a male bluebird sitting atop another, calling most beautigully for a mate. When the females arrive, one will no doubt find this lonely fellow and fall in love with his choice of nest box... let's hope. Bluebirds are definitely among my favourite birds.

While we're told this weather will last only for a few more days, it seems that the wildlife figure differently. How else can we explain the bees, mosquitoes, bird activity (early arrivals here on migration routes) and the eager calls of the female coyote who for the past two years has persistently tried to lure my boys over to her den somewhere along the river? Ah spring...even if it feels more like summer today, it's my favourite time of year with all the new growth. Hope you're enjoying whatever weather you are getting and that it's not harmful for you and yours.

PS - if you receive this blog via email notification, you likely can't play the video. Please go directly to the website: http://primarilypets.blogspot.com - hope you enjoy this - as well as the beautiful narcissus that graced my garden this afternoon.