A Walk in the Fall

I used to do a link up (that bombed when I slacked on my blog) called Wilderness Wednesday. Every Wednesday I would post the link up with a post of the things we did in nature that week.

I should probably start that again. But with Canada going into winter, nature can be a little white and a little cold. Not to say that winter isn't beautiful! It's just cold. Last winter was amazing. Normal winter... the hair in your nostrils can feel like they're gonna break off.

So maybe come spring....

However FALL in Canada is incredible. We have all the beautiful colors and the perfect temps. The girls and I went for a walk along our local bike path (a gorgeous 40+ kilometer path along the St. Lawrence river). Now that the temperatures are better, we get out walking a lot. With the healthy lifestyle we're working on, it's perfect!

We found a swarm of super cool looking bugs on a tree. The 2nd pic is of the bottom of the trunk. We discovered a few different ages of the bugs. The youngest ones are red and as they get bigger they turn more and more black.

Research proved that they're Boxedler bugs, thankfully harmless.

In several areas along the bike path are crab apple trees.The girls like to pick them and toss them into the water for the seagulls (who happily scoop them up!). Olivia also just likes to demonstrate her monkey skills while Brianna paranoidly watches.

We found a turkey vulture in the park along the bike path. Seeing them closer to our house is pretty uncommon but I've never seen one in the park area which is just off our downtown.

The St. Lawrence river is a huge river system. There's load of different wildlife including the ducks, seagulls and a heron hanging out on this rock.

Wilderness Wednesday

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This first set of pics are courtesy of Tanya, who stole the camera during breaks while her and Brianna were doing their running training.

Cornwall Island

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The Mallards are very populous and friendly around here 

Even though we're not technically by the sea, we have a lot of seagulls

We've also been very busy with our garden this past week!

Our garden was severely under-nourished (still is IMO!) so we added 20 bags of top soil, 5 bags of sheep manure and 2 bags of peat moss. I can't wait til the fall and next spring to add homemade compost!

Putting Brianna to work

Hubby found a pair of mating worms. I must say I never put much thought into how worms reproduce but Lee was so proud of the picture he took "for my blog" lol

Hubby, my muscles ;)

Now putting Tanya to work

Each girl have planted their own garden box this year

They are completely responsible for them... weeding, watering, ect...

More of my muscles... with Olivia supervising :)

Wilderness Wednesday

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We missed the last Wilderness Wednesday, so sorry about that! And then I was so tardy about this week's post, that I forgot to post it til Thursday! Very sorry about that too!


Nature is happening more and more! Things are growing, animals are coming back or expanding their families. I just love spring!

Hubby was getting impatient with the lack of color in our garden so far, so we bought a flat of pansies to brighten the place up!

The rose bush should be budding soon!

I love the curly leaves on this variety of hosta

We have some very friendly Chickadees in our neighbourhood that love our bird feeder

Brianna was thrilled to get this close to the butterfly

So far unidentified butterfly that seemed to know we wanted to study it

Wilderness Wednesday

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We got the opportunity to go on a nature walk with a gentleman from the River Institute (which we found out is based only 2 minutes out our front door!) We went to Guindon Park, which I did not know had hiking trails, for an amphibian workshop.

Wild Strawberry

Blood Root

When they're picked, the stems "bleed" hence the name Blood Root

Tanya with a Wood Frog

Brianna's best friend Rebecca happened to show up for the same trip and that made it all that much better of a trip!

Shelf Fungus

We're pretty sure this was another Wood Frog

Skunk Cabbage

Unspecified Tree Frog

A Newt/Salamander (we're not sure which)

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(Pardon the crappy cell phone pic) A woodpecker stalking a robin 

Some new growth in our garden! Yes there's loads of grass and weeds mixed in, but this is something someone who lived here before planted. I assume it's a spring-only type of plant since we didn't see anything but weeds/grass in that are when we moved in in November.

Grandma took the girls down to the water to feed the ducks. They apparently like rice cakes!


We're finally getting some rain this week which is much needed. While we're loving the sunny weather, it's the driest spring I've seen in a loooong time. 

Wilderness Wednesday

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Last week we had gorgeous weather that was more summer like than spring. This week we're back to the cooler, more dreary weather. 

 I believe this is my Bleeding Heart. I'm not completely sure though, cause I can't remember where I transplanted thing to the new house and I also can't find any early pics from last year!

The mystery Day Lily is almost over powering my poor Lupin!

Thankfully it appears that the lack of yard care (at all) last year when this house was empty didn't totally kill the lawn. Not that the lawn itself matters since we'll be tilling the whole yard and re-seeding, but at least we know there's still nutrients in the ground!


I was hoping to add bird pictures this week, but it seems between the damn pigeons and the larger Purple Martins, almost all my little birds have disappeared! Maybe it's the colder weather too. Here's hoping for some next week!

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Green stuff is growing bigger all over my yard!  This is some bush type of thing that a neighbour gave us last year. I'm not sure what it's called but in full growth it's got purplish flowers/leaves that bees really like.

My lilac tree is blooming leaves! I was soooo excited when we saw that our new house had a lilac tree, it is my ultimate favorite flower!

Somehow a Day Lily is growing next to my Lupin. Not sure how since there were no Day Lilies in this flower bed before and there were none in my old flower bed where this was growing last year. Good thing I like them!

The Purple Martins are back!

Unfortunately, so are the pigeons... They're scaring away the little birds at my bird feeder and are peeving me off at cleaning out my bird feeder in 2 days. Is there a natural way to get rid of them? These are city pigeons so while they'll fly away when you get near them, they don't go far and come right back.