On this very warm spring day (it topped 90°F), I was more than happy to take a break from the seemingly-endless rigmarole of planning, sorting, packing, discarding, and continuing to hoard certain things in our rather staggering stash of household goods. As we were having our morning beverages of choice, CD looked out the front window and alerted me to the presence of a few members of our neighborhood gang of “wild” turkeys. 
The largest tom was making a great show of displaying for the benefit (or, rather—and much more likely the intimidation) of the other tom in the small group; the object of all this attention, seemed to be not very impressed with the display, at least to my eye. And then, later in the morning, the pair of house wrens who have graced us with their return yet again, for what I believe is the fifth year in a row, have begun to set up shop in the little, (very) old wren house that was here when we bought the house nearly 20 years ago. 
Each year I open it up, clean it out, and re-secure the tin roof, and they seem to like what I do, so I don’t feel compelled to get more elaborate. In fact, they are out there warbling their little hearts out as I write this, and it’s nearly 8 pm. We’re doing something right.
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Wonderful post, I love the second shot in particular!
I almost included a different photo of the wren, because his eyes were partially closed in this one. But, then again, I tend to close my eyes when I sing from the heart, too, so this one made the cut!
I don’t know why it seems so strange to see a turkey in May. I don’t know what I thought they did while they were awaiting their command performances in November.
The wren photo is a real winner, in every sense. I love the bird’s pose, and I love even more the history of the house.
I had a feeling that you would like a bit of the wren house history, Linda, and I’m happy to see that you do. I liked its asymmetry and whimsy from the start, and it has been such a rewarding joy to see these little bundles of seemingly-insatiable energy return year after year. A bumblebee (queen?) seemed very interested in taking up residence before I gave it its annual spring cleaning, but I firmly believe that she and her brood will be much happier underground.
Oh I love these pictures! You’ve shown turkeys before and they always get to me – what an incredibly striking and characterful bird! And the Wren looks very like our species, Troglodytes troglodytes, but I imagine its a New World species. Wonderful photography, my friend.
You’re too kind, Adrian. Ours are Troglodytes aedon, which, I have just learned, are not only found from Canada to southern South America, but are also “the most widely distributed bird in the Americas.” We are constantly enthralled by their exuberant, bubbling calls and by their feistiness in defending their territory from many much larger birds. Spring will not be the same without them!
Yes, feisty is a very apt description for our Wren too!
Wrens are very pretty little birds but ours, here, don’t like to be photographed and will go out of their way (so it seems) not to be! Do yours have extremely loud voices like ours? On days when the weather is good enough to have the window open, we are deafened by the wren’s song – a tiny bird with a huge voice.. it’s louder than the thrushes.
Male turkeys are called ‘Toms’? Here male cats are. That’s quite an impressive looking chap… though I’ve never met one apart from, sadly, on a plate.
Ours, too, are loud in the extreme. It’s amazing the volume they can produce. It’s a good thing that their songs are so pretty, seemingly bubbling over with joyful exuberance (though they are probably more likely territorial warnings). Yes, male turkeys are toms, too. It’s rather odd that the females are just called hens, with no apparent effort at imagination, whereas the correct term for a female cat is a queen.