Hi Tweeties!

This is a dispatch from my stepbrother in crazy California you might find amusing. It's not just the humans down there who are nuts.......

Enjoy!

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Ay, Caromba!

I've told you about the mourning doves who nested atop the star jasmine vine on my patio this year. I was tickled to observe them and was happy when they raised two successful broods. I was surprised when they started in on brood three, albeit a wee bit disappointed because I was anxious to get my patio back the way it should be (I had made it a kludged-up mess in order to protect the fledglings from drowning in the spa on their first flights, and from the thorny Texas Ebony tree). I was shocked when they started brood #4. Good heavens! Who would have guessed? I was just certain that brood three had to be the last one this season, yet here we are at #4. Talk about dedicated parents, those mourning doves are amazing.

About midnight last night the raccoons came into the back yard. Lately a mama and her three youngsters have visited a few times a week, so I assumed it was them again. They are very entertaining and the chattering and chirring and splashing around in the spa is kind of soothing. Well, apparently it was raccoon date night. It was mama all right, but with her beau, not the kids. Three hours of mating, with chattering for about ten-minute periods punctuated by loud screams for about a minute, a few growls, then the cycle repeats. I hissed at them through the window and got them to move from the lawn under my bedroom window to underneath the plum tree, behind the hedge at the top of the backyard slope. Didn't phase them...they started right in again. I turned on the sprinklers for 15 minutes; they didn't skip a beat. Three hours of this.

Last night I went for a walk through the neighborhood after dinner. As I walked up the street approaching my house, I heard the raccoons somewhere nearby, chattering away in what I thought was the neighbor's back yard. "No, it can't be!" I gasped. Turns out yes, it can be. They (the raccoons, not the neighbors) were back in the same spot under my plum tree, right back at it again. At least last night they had the decency to begin at 21:00 instead of 00:00 like they did the night before. The sprinklers raining on them for 15 minutes once again did not affect their activities. We put in foam earplugs, closed the window closest to our heads, and turned up the fan to drown out the noise.

I am not predicting whether or not the randy raccoons will return tonight, nor whether the doves will start brood #5. Every time I'm just certain they will behave in a certain way, they surprise me and prove me wrong.

Here's to a peaceful night's sleep.

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Lydia Gaebe Bishop

Everett, WA