Out and About Close to Home

I took a late afternoon walk through our neighborhood recently. When I got to the pond, I didn’t see our resident green heron but there was a lot of bird noises. I thought maybe it was the birds finding good roosts for the night…then I saw the reason: a red-tailed hawk in the pine tree near the pond…surveying the place.

He was still for a few minutes then started looking around more…then flew away and the area got quieter almost immediately and I headed home.

As I walked up to our house, I noticed that the bush near our garage needed trimming. This would be the second time for this year. The next morning I went out to trim it – remembering to take the ‘before’ picture. It started out looking like a porcupine…then became a bush with a mohawk trim…

Then an asymmetrical bush. I cut some branches from the inside because I want it even shorter. The step stool I have that is easiest for me to carry around to trim bushes does not give me quite enough height to reach the top easily. Note that I used a lot of different tools: electric hedge trimmers, long handled pruners, and saw. I will do more with the pruners and saw to make the bush shorter!