Toad in our bird bath tonight. That’s a first. We usually empty the baths to keep mosquitoes at bay and keep cats from being too keen on the backyard at night. Not tonight!

Northern Mockingbird in our backyard. They’re not nearly as brave as the scrub jays but they’re using our backyard more and more.

A happy scrub jay feasting on some big bird seeds.

Blue Jay yelling at everything this afternoon. Maybe it’s angry at the wildfire smoke.

A scrub jay checking out the new bird feeder. Birds haven’t taken to it yet. They’re still eating grapes and desiccated elderberries.

Our trio of Scrub Jays are leaving almond hulls behind. Maybe they’re giving us gifts for providing water? We do compost….

Here’s some hope that our trio of Scrub Jays will eat our cultivated California native grapes.

Metallic ribbon and a fake bird of prey truly keeps the birds away from our figs.

Hummingbirds love these cultivated native California fuchsias so here’s their bird’s eye view of them.

Cultivated native California grapes. Seedy & thick skinned but good to eat. Since the birds aren’t.