A bluejay is human; he has got all a man's faculties and a man's weakness.

Naturally
 Autumn colors popped and fell. Unlike Maxwell House coffee, whose slogan is "Good to the last drop," a leaf is good after the last drop. The leaves on the ground are beautiful unless you detest raking them.
 The frost had deleted most of the wasps and bees. Emily Dickinson wrote, "The pedigree of honey does not concern the bee; a clover, any time, to him Is aristocracy." The bees that do all the work are females. That might surprise no one.
 I listened to blue jays go on and on. Mark Twain wrote, “A bluejay is human; he has got all a man's faculties and a man's weakness.” I figured these were discussing the merits of the electoral college. Mark Twain also wrote, “You never saw a bluejay get stuck for a word. He is a vocabularized geyser."
 Horned larks gathered on the roadside on a windy day. There was and might still be a brand of cigarettes called Lark. I have never seen a horned lark smoking one. A road-killed muskrat wasn't far from the larks. The muskrat is commonly known as Ondatra zibethicus and rightly so. Captain & Tennille sang “Muskrat, muskrat. Candlelight. Doing the town. And doing it right. In the evening, it's pretty pleasing. Muskrat Suzie, Muskrat Sam. Do the jitterbug at a Muskrat Land. And they shimmy, Sam is so skinny.” I have nothing to add to that. 
 Brenda Kotasek of St. Peter volunteers at the fabulous Henderson Hummingbird Garden and saw the last hummingbird on Oct. 6 and last monarch butterfly on Oct. 8.
 My feeders were so busy, I expected to hear "Yackety Sax," the song played during the chase scenes on "The Benny Hill Show." Pine siskins seemed to be everywhere. The wind, white-throated sparrows and chickadees whistled. So did the temperature as it whistled past my ears on its way down. Harris's sparrows, which I sometimes hear whistle as they pass through in the spring, magically appeared. I whistled on their behalf. Why not? As Monty Python's Eric Idle sang, "When you're chewing on life's gristle, don't grumble, give a whistle."
Q&A
 "How fast can a mole tunnel?" I read something from Purdue University saying moles can tunnel 100 feet per day. I've been told and read often that they can dig 160 feet in a single night, but couldn't find research documenting that. Moles nest deep underground but make tunnels as they burrow through the soil in search of food. Surface tunnels are the raised ridges in lawns created by moles working just below the surface. Folkloric remedies haven't proven effective in discouraging moles.
 "What can I do about powdery mildew on lilacs?" Learn to ignore it. It's a cosmetic disease as it is on most woody ornamentals.
 "Do you recommend using pruning paints on trees?" No, research has found they slow natural healing. You might use them if you're forced to prune an oak during the growing season. It keeps sap beetles from finding the wound, which they'd find almost immediately and possibly transmit oak wilt. Latex house paint would work as all that is needed is a physical barrier.
 "Why does a monarch butterfly chrysalis have gold on it?" Chrysallis is from the Greek chrysallid, which is from chrysos meaning "gold," referring to the metallic gold-like sheen of some butterfly pupae. The gold is created by a coupling of a carotenoid pigment and hill-like structures that reflect light from their peaks. There are theories as to the purpose of the gold. It could act as camouflage -- mirroring colors of the surroundings and breaking up the shape of the pupa or it might look like dew droplets. It could be a warning coloration, which acts like a "Poison" sign. Or it might filter particular wavelengths of light, which might be harmful to the monarchs.
 "What is the one thing that most often becomes litter?" According to the Ocean Conservancy, the top 5 most littered items are: 1. Cigarette butts 2. Food wrappers 3. Plastic bottles 4. Plastic bottle caps 5. Plastic bags.
 "Why do robins molt right before they migrate south?" Robins molt so they'll have fresh feathers for the flight. These fresh feathers are better insulation against the winter cold. Robins start molting flight feathers in mid-June and finish molting by early September. They molt body feathers from late July into October. Each feather is pushed out by a new one. Most feathers last a year, but if a feather is pulled out when a robin isn't molting, it's replaced promptly.
Thanks for stopping by
 "Tell me, O Octopus, I begs. Is those things arms, or is they legs? I marvel at thee, Octopus; If I were thou, I'd call me Us." — Ogden Nash
 "God in his wisdom made the fly. And then forgot to tell us why." — Ogden Nash
 Do good.

©Al Batt 2020

A Harris’s sparrow is a handsome sparrow. North America’s largest sparrow breeds only in Canada. Photo by Al Batt

Eventually, everything is repurposed into something for birds.

A Blue Jay will fly across five state lines for peanuts. At least that’s its campaign promise.