The rain fell all night so when I woke up I opened all the windows and let the fresh autumn air in and took turns watching the house sparrows outside the bay window with Tonka and Odie who won the “who gets to sleep in?!” lottery last night.

I couldn’t resist the look Tonka gave me when I went out to say goodnight…

They are all so good about giving me guilt trips but Tonka is especially good at it! 🙄

The sparrows stay in the viburnum all year long, and keep me company every morning with their loud chirps and chitters and flapping of their wings as they hop around from branch to branch, gossiping with each other and squabbling over who knows what.

I’m sure if I watched closely I would see that there’s a pecking order among their flock, just like with my birds. Someone rules the roost in that viburnum.

They don’t like the dogs but they don’t seem to mind me in the window, watching and snapping pictures. It feels like some of them even enjoy the attention and pose for me.

I think they know I’m the bird feeder lady, to be honest!

As soon as I finished my coffee I put on my warm hat and my sweater and headed out to feed everyone. It feels so good to have the cool, damp air in my face again.

Ahhhh! 😊

As soon as I turned the corner by the little pond out front, the sparrows scattered to the surrounding trees and waited for me to get over near the poultry pens before they regroup at the viburnum and watch in anticipation for me to go back inside so they can rush the pens and pick at the feed along with the chickens, ducks and pheasant.

It’s a little less chaotic out there now that we butchered quite a few of the birds. We will have to separate out the remaining males soon, though, or there will be fighting and the chaos levels will go right back up.

We mainly kept the younger ones, like this drake with one green feather on his back, who will be breeding the hens and replenishing our stock next spring.

The only real chaos left right now stems from the fact that we still have a few of the black Wyandottes left who aren’t friendly and aren’t nice and aren’t ever happy. They always think the grass (or in this case the feed) is better on the other side of the fence. 😆

They may be outnumbered by the buffs but they still rule the roost. For now…