by CKR
I almost put up an extra last Wednesday. I was pulling cheatgrass in and around a flowerbed where I want to plant a lilac, and suddenly I had the feeling that I just shouldn't pull that next handful without looking. 
Do you see him? He stuck there, frozen, terrified, his little nose hardly ticking. I went into the house to get the camera. Still there. I took that photo, then decided to see if he'd put up for removing some of the cheatgrass in front of his nose and the weed basket. He did. I took a couple more photos and weeded down at the other end of the bed. It occurred to me that a scale marker would be nice, so I went back into the house and got my Swiss Army knife. He was very obliging for this final optimal photo. 
He was so quiet, I worried that he was sick. I figured that he wouldn't be there the next day, one way or another. I've heard the coyotes at night. I saw him yesterday again, in hip-hop shape, but an anemone I planted a couple of weeks ago has toothmarks on it...
More yard blogging below the fold.
This plant is about six centimeters across. I particularly like the arrangements of the flower buds, sort of spirally symmetric. I suspect that they are in a Fibonacci series, but I haven't counted them. Many plants arrange themselves that way.
This is another delightful little plant, the flowers about the same size as the yellow ones, but arranged differently. I love the yellow centers in the cream outers.
I haven't checked the field guides on these. Maybe later.
I put up hummingbird feeders over the weekend. I've seen the earliest around April 1, and many of the forerunners (largely male broadtails) are here by April 15, along with the swifts and vultures. A broadtail found one of them by evening. I made it easy for him by putting it in a blooming crabapple. They found the other (in a nonblooming tree) by the evening of the second day. The male broadtails make themselves obvious by making a metallic trill with their wings. This morning I heard a more muffled buzz and saw a hummingbird land on the feeder. I suspect a black-chinned male. The blackchins make that sort of sound, but I've also watched broadtails fly past in a stealth mode.
Here's a site on hummingbirds, with photos. I particularly like the cursor.
Finally, I'd like to congratulate the small population of ivory-billed woodpeckers for remaining concealed so long. Not all of us can stay out of the fray so nicely. Lindsay at Majikthise has a short article with links. Many thanks to her for doing that work for us.