"There's Something in the Garden!"

Back in the day, Mom used to play the piano and organ for the youth choir at the church.  As part of her duties, she led the music for the Vacation Bible School.  Thus, my kids grew up learning a lot of precious little songs that they still remember to this day.  One summer, they learned a song called "There's Something in the Garden".  Wording of the song stated..There's something in the garden, what can it be?..There's something in the garden, I really cannot see!  There's something in the garden..hear its funny sound! Ribbit, Ribbit..a frog is what I found!"   The song went on with several more verses each time with a different animal.  Well, my kids could not be stumped by mere verses!  They added their own!  Instead of the normal three or four verses, they extended it to every animal that they knew!  All I could say was..that garden sure had a lot of animals!  Two weeks ago, when I was rocking my new grandbaby, Mary Ruth, I sang to her!  Not that I have a fantastic singing voice or even a moderately nice singing voice but I figured at four weeks old, she did not care!  So I sang!  It has been a long time since I sang to my kids so I was a bit rusty and needed prompting by my son, Michael.  "There's Something in the Garden" was one of the songs that he recommended!

Today, while Michael was picking the squash, his dad and I were checking the progress of the other plants.  We could hear a  passel of Blue Jays squawking up a storm in a nearby pine tree.  Try as we might, we saw no reason for them to be raising such a ruckus!  Silly birds!  There was something in the garden, what can it be?  We knew it was there but just could not see it!  Later, however, the story was different!  Mark and I headed out to sit in the cooling breeze and noticed that the jays were still at it!  Looking up, we spied the culprit!!  Right above us was a beautiful owl!  A Great Horned Owl was visiting the garden!!  Now I am one that loves owls!  I collect owl figurines and have several pictures of owls hanging in the house.  They just make me happy!  This one made me happy!  I am glad that it was an owl that we found!

Great Horned Owls are remarkable hunters!  With their large eyes and great vision, they pretty much can catch whatever they please.  They get their name "Great Horned Owl" from the tufts of feathers on either side of their head.  Though these appear to be horns and are sometimes called "ear tufts", they are neither. They are just tufts of feathers..nothing more.  I believe this is the same owl that has been visiting the garden nightly in search of a meal.  With the invasion of voles tunneling about, I am sure the owl has quite the easy time dining!  At night, voles make their way to the surface and can easily be snatched by an alert owl!  I read where an owl will pluck a bird before eating it.  There have been quite a few instances where I have come across mounds of dove feathers in the yard as of late.  Perhaps the remnant of an owl's supper?  Or breakfast?

There's something in the garden..hear its funny sound..hoo hoo..an owl is what we found!