A Work in Progress

There is a bird who lives in our backyard that has been a nuisance for the last three years. For starters, I don't even know what this bird is. No clue. I tried to Google it using terms like "bird with annoying screech" and "kicks up dirt and leaves scrounging for bugs and worms." Those searches didn't work. Weird. From Google, I received names like finches and woodpeckers, shrikes, and larks. If I could take a picture of the bird, I'd post it so you could see this miscreant in action. But, he's too fast for me. So, I'm no help there. Nor is he. This bird has a black head, and white body, with red on its wings. He’s quite beautiful in spite of his annoying personality   The good news about researching local "Sacramento birds" is that I now know the identifying name of our resident owl. It's a Western Screech Owl. Yes, we have a resident owl. This adorable owl has made a home out of our old cable dish (and accouterments) that we had