This sunny morning around 11am, I finally saw a Monarch butterfly -- first of this season -- most likely migrating South.  It wandered North through the back-yard then fed for a while on the last blooms of the yellow and the pink Buddleia bushes in the Play area.  Afterwards it hung in the warm sunshine from the needles of one of the weary Hemlock trees which are rapidly thinning and dying off from a tenacious Wooly Adelgid infestation.  After pumping its wings, then hanging still for a minute, the Monarch flew South down the back-yard until it disappeared into the woods, still heading South.
     Five of the local turkey hens were wandering in and out of the yard today, clucking and pecking around.