All the delightful sights, sounds and scents of Spring fill the air - BUT IT'S WINTER!
Wait?! WHAT?!!! Birds are frantically darting between nest and foraging to feed hatchlings. The delicate pink and white blossoms of the fruit trees nod in the breeze. It's a total confusion of seasons. The air is chilly. But not a real winter chill. While it is beautiful to see all the new life it is also disconcerting. Where will we be in a month? Will fruit blossoms, summer seedlings and those tiny fledglings survive through winter - when it really hits with all its icy ferocity? For now we savour the beauty of new life.
This week's birding contest inspired by 
The incredible architectural mud feit of the swallows and little martens decorate many rooving structures on our homestead. Then there's the huge and messy construction by sparrows who use every imaginable object, natural and man-made, to build their nests.
One of my favourites is the home built by our malachite sunbirds in the cactus. As mama sunbird peeps expectantly out on the world she incubates her eggs and awaits warmer weather. It may not come but hope is strong in the face of the impossible.