This morning was the first day I really got out into the yard for anything beyond filling the birdfeeders. My plan is to leave one silo feeder and two niger feeders in the lilac bush, in hopes of attracting an indigo bunting or two this year. The silo feeder of mixed seed will insure that there's plenty of activity around the bush, and there are still house and gold finches that visit, so I'm counting on word getting around to the indigos. But today, I went out with my forked weed digger and flipped out a few dozen dandelions - and there lying on the grass I found the first eggshell of the season. I'm not sure whose it is, or where the nest might be. Many species of birds fly the empty shells and drop them away from the nest, to keep predators from finding it, so it could be from anywhere. But it was a wonderful thing to see. A lot of the other birds are still displaying to potential mates, so whoever dropped this shell is a real...early bird!
Nearby, the violets I transplanted from my neighbor's yard have begun to bloom. There's some regular dark purple ones mixed in there, too, but they haven't begun to open yet. A weathered leaf from the red maple, destined to become topsoil, rests beside them like a memento mori of the past winter. All in all, it was a dewy, peaceful Sunday, with scarcely a breeze; the lake barely making a murmur.
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