The Backyard and Beyond

I never thought I’d want to visit Texas. I guess one forms preconceived ideas about a place and it didn’t occur to me that it could be more than oil…

This past year, I’ve been thinking about ways to make the yard a more appealing sanctuary for birds. I’d like to attract a greater variety — not that there is…

As part of our National Parks tour, and as a way to escape the Wisconsin winter if only briefly, we hopped a plane for south Florida last Tuesday, January 24.…

We finally took the trip we’ve been planning for 13 years. Well, to be fair, we weren’t PLANNING IT for 13 years, but our original trip was waylaid by life…

Yes, it comes, eventually. We wait, with some impatience, and then suddenly, it arrives. Here’s a great excerpt from a poem by John Goethe: LATE WISCONSIN SPRING Snow melts into…

The days are short, The sun a spark, Hung thin between The dark and dark. –John Updike Although it’s just mid-January, the days are already noticeably longer. Still, they seem…

I used to think sparrows were some of the least interesting and least colorful birds—just little brown birds that all look alike. But I’ve changed my mind as I’ve become…

Earlier this month, I traveled to Northwestern Wisconsin for a family reunion. My Mom’s side of the family emigrated from Sweden and settled on a farm near Grantsburg and every…

And now a random assortment of pictures from the months of June and July. I’ve been taking a lot of photos but not taking all that much time to sort…

I belong to a Facebook group called Wisconsin Birding. It’s members are from all over the state and people post pictures and sightings of all kinds of birds—from those found…