Baby birds!

This basket is hanging in my pergola outside of our back door. I am standing on a ladder to take this picture. There are actually two babies in here but one is squashing the other in the particular picture. A few weeks ago a mama dove took over this basket as a good home to have her babies. We saw the dad for a few days, and then he disappeared. Knowing that doves mate for life leads me to believe that he came to the end of his life before he could see these particular babies born. Sad.

I was going to try to get all philosophical about the circle of life, and new beginnings but frankly...I got nothin'. It has been fun for our family to watch this family grow. The babies are very cute, and hungry! Mama is having to leave often now to be able to provide enough food for her babies. That is really the only reason I was able to get this picture.

As soon as we are at the backdoor, she squats down over her babies to protect them from us. So in order to see them without her fear, we watch with binoculars from our kitchen. Our dogs have no idea that there is a nest so close to our house. If JoJo (our lab) knew....holy cow! It would be chaos on a regular basis. There is a nest in one of the trees in the backyard, and JoJo sits at the base of the tree and barks incessantly so I can only imagine what she would do if she knew there was one so close.

Anyway...this is what we do with our spare time these days...it has been fun!