Owls in the Owl Box!

Several years ago, I built a screech owl box, using these plans (click here).  I installed it about 30 feet up in an ash tree.  Since then, I have seen squirrels examine it out of curiosity, but not much else.  Until this year.  This year, a pair of screech owls have decided to take up residence and they have a couple of babies. 

She feeds them each evening starting around 8:30 pm.  Her pattern is to fly to a nearby branch and call to them.  They squeal back, and then she flies up and feeds them bugs.  Apparently, she is quite skilled at catching them because she flies back to the nest about every minute.  Here she is in action; the best I could do considering it was after dark.

I also learned that owls make a warning sound when you get too close, a sharp snapping of the beak.  She has flown just overhead snapping her beak at me a couple of times while I have been taking pictures.  I read that owls will sometimes rap a human on the head if they get cranky enough and if a person gets too close.  We sit back a little farther now and use the binoculars to watch her feed.  It's a great show at sunset! 

Here are the babies making their sounds... you'll have to excuse the loud whistling at the end; it's me:

We enjoying watching them in the evenings.  I hope they will make it on their own and we'll get to hear them at night making their high pitched calls.  If I get any better pictures or video, I'll post it.

Honor

I don't know where to credit this photo... it is found all over the net.  But it reminds me that actions always speak louder than words. And while I'm at it, kudos to the men and women in uniform.  Where ever there is a dirtbag that needs tossed overboard, or a nation that needs a chance to be rebuilt, the US is there to try and make it happen.  Our soldiers are buried all around the world for their efforts to bring freedom to the people. God bless the USA!

Times Square, New York at night

I had an opportunity this week to travel to New York city for a couple of days and take in the sights and sounds.  We had a gruelling schedule of landmarks and activities to try and take in while taking a bite out of the big apple.  I have to admit that I missed the culture and buzz when I returned to my quite home in the mountains.  Of course, culture and buzz have quite the premium these days, so I am thankful that the company I work for covered the costs.

We took in the subway, rode a taxi with a driver hell bent on qualifying for the Daytona 500, and saw the New York skyline from the Staten Island ferry.  Of course we took in some Broadway shows, explored international cuisine, and managed to do some shopping as well.  We also took a stroll through Central Park, which I have never done before.  I managed to literally walk into Sigourney Weaver, but that's a story for another time.  Overall, I give New York a thumbs up as a vacation destination if you've never visited before.  Just do your homework and find a hotel you can afford near a subway station.

I'll leave you with this video of Times Square at around 11 pm at night.  You can't really tell it's night unless you look between the skyscrapers!

Blue Ridge Mountains

These are the Blue Ridge Mountains as seen from I-26 in North Carolina.  A photo from the front seat of the pickup hardly does it justice, but it was too scenic to pass up.  I never get tired of seeing these mountains.  This morning they are dressed in the heavy clouds of an approaching spring rain.

Measure twice, cut once

Sooner or later, every woodworker who blogs posts their lamentations over some project that went south due to a mistake made while holding a measuring tape.  This is that post for me, although I have to admit that on more than one occasion I have had to re-cut a piece of plywood.  I figure with my tools and a pencil, the best that I can do is 1/64 inch accuracy.  If something is 1/32 inch off, I can usually see it with my eye.  So imagine my surprise when I made shelves that were 1/16 of an inch too wide. 

That doesn’t sound like much, but this bookshelf has to fit inside the 3 by 4 inch legs of the headboard of a loft bed.  The legs are joined with a mortise and tenon joint and it is not going to move 1/16 of an inch.  So I had the joy of removing that much material from the side of my bookshelf.

I decided the punishment for the crime would be to use a hand planer to correct the situation.  That decision has the added bonus of sharpening my planer after running it through the glue used to hold plywood together.  Anyway, by the time I could go rent a power planer and take it back, I could finish the job by hand.  Smoothing, filling, and repainting my small mistake will set me back about three hours, plus an hour to sharpen my planer.

No real need to worry about the moral of the story here.  In the end, I am still making chips and dust and doing something that I enjoy.  Although doing something twice does tarnish the joy a little bit, it still beats spending time at work by a good margin.  I have to admit that sharpening a planer is not much of a punishment either.  Since I need to touch this one up, I might as well sharpen the others while I have my water stones out.