Blogger Patricia Youngquist is an author and a photographer. Her recent e-book, BIRD TALES, is interactive and includes the Blue jay featured above. Prior works include versions of WORDS IN OUR BEAK, where the stories are narrated by Cam, a female cardinal. Additionally, some of her photographs have been licensed by Fine Art America to reproduce as wall art and on to an array of surfaces for various products! Do view both side-bars for specific details on all of this.
Lilies of the Valley (the flower type seen in the images directly above growing in front of a brownstone on the street where the building I live in is located), are not as innocent as they look, they can be deadly.
I first was introduced to this flower type when my grandfather, seen in the picture directly below with a tree he had just planted.
His Lilies of the Valley grew alongside of the northern portion of his home which is off camera in this image. He might've been an influence in my liking trres and garden,s which is something I've discussed in one of my earliest posts here on Blogger.
I do not recall ever hearing about the dangers posed by Lilies of the Valley, but if you'd like to read about this phenomenon, dear reader, please allow me to refer you to an article published by The Spruce, and that dear reader, is my Tuesday's Truth for this two hundred and thirteenth segement.
In 2019, I published a blog post about this holiday and my endeavors as a pinhole photographer. Within that entry, I also have included images of my photographs that were created with pin-hole cameras. If you'd like to see that post, please click here.
At this juncture photographically, my emphasis is on flora and fauna. My photographs of these subjects can be found within a number of posts on this blog and some of them are also featured on my Pinterest Boards as well as Instagram.
Moreover, my three volume book series, Words In Our Beak includes hundreds of images of flora and fauna.
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| MY BOOK SERIES |
The goal of these books is to open readers to a simple understanding of the winged world and their environment. Set in a rooftop urban garden (mine) in New York City, my story is told in the voice of Cam, a female cardinal, who visits it. These books are directed to children and adults who are curious about birds (as well as gardening) want to learn about these topics from a unique perspective.
For as discouraged as I might feel from time to time, whenever I see birds (such as the ones featured in the next sequence of photographs) in nearby Central Park, I feel more hopeful about most circumstances.
This past Saturday was phase three of my extensive, complicated, much needed dental procedure which I initially mentioned here on Blogger back in February and since that time have posted updates, the last one was on 4-7-2021.
In any event, as I stated, my procedure this past Saturday was phase three of the ordeal and although my time in the chair was much shorter, the procedure was awkward because something is going on with my gums near the area of the affected teeth and my malfunctioning bridge which have been involved.
So I'm not done yet. I have to return to the chair which is disheartening on one level, but it's good on another. This turn of events gives me a bit (a very little bit) of time to scramble for paid assignments and spread the word about my fundraiser.
That being said, last Saturday's appointment left me with a feeling of discouragement as well as a huge headache, so I took a brief walk in nearby Central Park.
During my stroll, I came upon an egret who was carrying a live fish in his beak as he flew across the pond to eat the creature. The following sequence of photographs is a "play by play" of the transport I witnessed.
Today I passed through there after dropping off my compost at the nearby greenmarket.
I came upon many lovely sights, including a squirrel.
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.'"
The photo atop this entry features a screen-shot from the You Tube video posted directly below.
I confess that I'm having trouble id-ing this beauty and plan to reach out to the Park's Department for help, but in the interim, any TLLG blog readers out there know the type of tree pictured here?
On another note I have a few trees in my rooftop garden, including a flowering one known as a Crabapple Tree.
FAA does not disclose the name of a given buyer but every now and then a buyer lets me know which is the case with GK, the woman who purchased these cards. She notified me that she had bought them and I'm grateful for the sale and that she took the time to let me know. GK and I met over ten years ago when Vivianne Tvilling (owner of äskling a boutique that was on the UWS for a number of years) had an event.
As for these particular cards, they feature views of my garden, which is the setting for my three volume book series, Words In Our Beak. These are directed to children and adults who are curious about gardening as well as birds and want to learn about them from a unique perspective.
The bird (American robin) featured in the sequnce of photographs atop this entry is not exactly "rocking in the tree tops" nor is he "singing his song," but he seems to enjoy being in an Ailanthus, although not half as much as I enjoyed having him in my midst.
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| MY BOOK SERIES |
