European starlings contine to enjoy my garden. (Saturday's Sentiment)

European starlings the bird type featured in the image atop this entry (visiting my roof extension garden) were brought to NYC from England 131 years and one month ago yesterday (3-16-1890).

Friday's Fact: Rainfall still doesn't deter birds from visiting my garden.

 

The first half of this month has certainly lived up to the adage re April having showers, however this year they could be taking away May flowers, as the rain has been more like torrents than showers. Flowers are falling off their stems as a result and flowering trees are dropping their blooms. Such heavy precipitation often begs the question, Where do birds go when it rains?

A number of interesting articles have been published about this, including one by Chipper Birds. As for me, I often know where they go because a number of songbirds spend their rainy days in my garden. This is something I mentioned in a recent post here on Blogger which includes a male cardinal visiting my place during a rainfall.

During yesterday’s heavy rain several species spent time in my place, including a Northern mockingbird and an American robin (the bird types featured in the photographs atop this entry).

Thursday's Tale: Certain Central Park Tulips Now Have a Georgia O'Keefe Look

This is the first year that I do not have tulips in my garden as I was not able to plant new bulbs in 2020 because of the pandemic. In general, my tulip bulbs don't winter-over well even with my diligent garden winterizing. I truly miss having them this year but memories of my tulips sustain me. I have had such amazing varieties during the many years of my having a garden. Be that as it may when it comes to not having tulips in my garden this year, I have been able to appreciate them in tree pits as well as in Central Park. The tulip seen in the photo atop this entry is one I saw there five days ago.

When do my pictures say the words or when do my words paint a picture?

It is such an honor to have mockingbirds visit my garden (which one is doing in the image atop this entry), but today for my Wednesday Wisdom segment, I can't find the words to describe the feelings such visitors provoke in me.

Therefore, I will use the words that Henry David Thoreau used to describe when another bird type (a sparrow) how he felt visited his garden.

Here is what he said: “I once had a sparrow alight upon my shoulder for a moment, while I was hoeing in a village garden, and I felt that I was more distinguished by that circumstance than I should have been by any epaulet I could have worn.”

This quotation has been referenced in a number of my blog posts including one published on an anniversary of one of Thoreau's birthdays (July 12th 2017).

Usually I'm not one who is at a loss for words, which is a good thing since I'm a writer but today, when it comes to describing the feeling I had the other day upon seeing a lone mockingbird in my garden, I don't have much to say. 

Perhaps I'm thinking that my words about this have all been said by me (in prior posts) or have been said by writers whom admire.

Another possibly for lack of words might be due to the fact that I've taken a picture of what  I saw and it might suffice due to it being one of those picture says a thousands words things.

According to a web-page, "the idea that a picture can convey what might take many words to express was voiced by a character in Ivan S. Turgenev's novel Fathers and Sons, 1862: 'The drawing shows me at one glance what might be spread over ten pages in a book.'"

Daffodils: A contendor for NYC's flower + an inspiration to poets (Tuesday's Truths WK 211)

Welcome to my 211th segement of Tuesday's Truths, where I'm pointing out that evidently Michael Bloomberg, when he was mayor of NYC, wanted to designate daffodils, the flower type featured in the image directly above (which was taken in Central Park) to be our city's flower (the state flower is the rose).