The warm weather has meant a little more bird watching here for me and the cats.

I keep the feeders full the best I can all winter, but the finches come to the yard mainly for the seeds from the coneflower heads. Last years stock is almost all depleted, so they’ve turned their focus to the kettle feeder I have in the willows. I keep it full of straight black-oil sunflower seeds, which is another favourite of the finches.

It’s now not a surprise to come out and see a finch or two on it. Like Mr. and Mrs. Goldfinch here. I’m not sure what was going on with Mr. Finch’s head…

He had some sort of wild and crazy feather do going on.

And while the finches are feasting… the crocuses keep crocusing…

Last weekend’s snow didn’t seem to hurt them a bit and there are new blooms popping up every day. The mix I planted is supposed to last two months with early-late flowering bulbs, so it will be fun to see if it actually does.

More bunches of Winter Aconite are popping up too. I’m very glad about this because I was really worried most of them had died off, even though they are supposed to be pretty robust.

And the Squill (also known as Glory of the Snow) is also starting to bloom. I have this in four colors – pink, white, purple, and blue. And it’s all throughout the front gardens so there will be much more coming.

Friends back in my old city already have daffodils blooming. I’m jealous, but it looks like mine won’t be too far off.

In the mean time, the bees are making do with what’s blooming already. Mid week, the pussywillow was absolutely alive with honey bees (temps reached almost 20C again)

You can see the pussy willow is covered in pollen. It’s one of the best early pollen sources for pollinators, so I always recommend planting some if you can. It even gets some unexpected visitors.

The ladybugs are always welcome in this garden! And it’s nice to see they made it through the winter!