spent the better part of yesterday and today working on the fish tanks… I’ve been thinking about how far I’ve come from the person who admired the tank, but had no desire to get my hands dirty… that was all for my beloved…
yesterday I used the pump (for emptying the hot tub) to remove the majority of the water that was still in them… then I removed the rocks and scrubbed down the sides… never leave a tank partly filled because the scum on the glass becomes rather difficult to remove, lol…
next I used the wet vac to remove the last of the water…
in between all that, I scrubbed each and every rock from the tanks… that took a while as I did it between reading times;-)…
rocks were placed back in, and then the hose brought in from outside to fill them up…
finally I put both pumps back in and got them working…
I watched as one of the little red squirrels figured out how to climb the slinky on the pole by the garage… it made a cool sound as the squirrel climbed it like a ladder…
so, I reset the solar light that was holding it down so it is loose and hope that will keep the squirrel from getting up there again…
and look what I spotted;-)…
these pictures are a little fuzzy, but when the squirrel was flying up and down the slinky, they were moving very quickly…
I did not put this almost completely eaten strawberry (which I found on the weekend) on the top of the deck…
and then, a few days ago I spotted one of the red squirrels racing across the deck and into the cedars, with a whole strawberry in his mouth, which he took from the hanging basket…
luckily, I have been able to get a few of the berries to eat, lol…
and they were delicious… now to figure out how to foil the squirrels from getting any more🤪…
what a treat it was to watch a new batch of baby house sparrows test out their wings…
they kind of hover when they are trying to figure out where they want to land…
and they don’t really understand that a person might not be safe to land close to…
once they’ve finally found a spot, they sit there and call mom or dad to come and feed them… I finally got a photo of the feeding, although it is a little fuzzy, lol…
ordered some solar motion sensor lights for the garden last Wednesday…
wasn’t sure if they would work, but was hopeful they would frighten the raccoons away…
they arrived on Monday and were easy to install… one went at the edge of the bridge and the other is set on the top of the deck…
was so excited that night when they worked… happily it had been sunny all day…
the next night it stormed and they were on most of the time as the wind was blowing all the leaves and floating plants around when the rain wasn’t pouring down…
will see how they work when the raccoons stop by again…