Pruning will fill up much of February and March if days warm enough to hold pole clippers and saws.
What was I thinking to plant a climbing hydrangea on the beautiful Shagbark Hickory . . . a good trim here and there will open to view some of the striking textured bark. Still, winter does reveal the beauty of this marriage. It is summer when the groovy Shagbark is lost to me. Lichen alters another tree’s bark, as noted in the distance, on a sound and solid oak.
Bearing up to the cold, resident buteos choose cherry and oak, standing tall within the north and easterly fields, as their lookout perches. A juvenile Red-shouldered Hawk eyes the frozen solid ground, and the human not too far away within warm barn-studio walls.
The Red-shouldered Hawk feels uncomfortable with my presence and so takes flight towards the forest and river below.
Our more frequently viewed buteo, sighted just a few minutes after the Red-shouldered flew off, prefers the distance of an oak firmly holding along the eastwardly slope. Red-tailed Hawks are always welcome by this community member but not so appreciated by most birds of our habitat.
I am never surprised to see crows, blue jays and even hummers and tree swallows chasing buteos. New Year’s Eve day showed me yet another bird or flock of birds in chase of a hawk. Cedar Waxwings are barely visible in the top tier of the oak the Red-tailed Hawk is also occupying.
A closer look above and their shapes become perceptible but not their mood for only moments after this shot, and too quick for my capture, about twenty or so waxwings were in hot pursuit of the Red-tailed Hawk.
Soon, after the chase, the Cedar Waxwings began doing what waxwings are most often seen in pursuit of . . . harvesting and gulping down little crabapples. I did not know they had such pluck to chase a hawk away.
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