Thursday afternoon, in a brief moment of sunlight between bouts of hail and
snow, I saw my first-of-season TURKEY VULTURES. There were 3 of them soaring
between exits 27 and 30 along I5 here in Cowlitz County.



I heard a RUFOUS HUMMINGBIRD zoom by on February 14, so I put out the nectar
feeder. My neighbor, who lives a full 200 feet higher than we do said he got
his first Rufous on January 26 this year. It buzzed his head when he was
checking out the nectar feeder on his front porch.



I finally got a long, good look at "our" hummer on March 20 while he sipped
away on the nectar near sunset. He was absolutely stunning, but the light
was too low to get a decent photograph.



Over the winter, I planted numerous native flowers, trees and shrubs,
including 3 Red-flowering Currants, on our property. In a couple of years, I
hope to be able to do away with the nectar feeder entirely.



Amy Hill

Kalama, WA

Cowlitz County

628 feet up

60stops2home at kalama dot com

Artlessfun at yahoo dot com