A quick painting of that gorgeous Pelee inhabitant.

Mixed media.

Nearly a year he’s sat there on the easel in my living room, so very near completion but not quite.  Painting is always an exciting process in the early stages — the life studies, the preliminary work, laying the initial compositional sketch down on that freshly stretched sheet.  As time goes by, however, it becomes more difficult to pick up that brush and continue where I left off.  Eventually I lose my rhythm entirely, and the work is mostly abandoned.  I’ve been harbouring a lot of resentment toward this little fellow, and I think he’ll stay in the portfolio for awhile — we need a break from each other.

The young Peregrines at the Burlington lift bridge fledged about a week and a half ago.  They’re still a long ways from independence, however, and spend most of their time resting on the girders or sharpening their skills through flight games.  The male sustained an injury to his crop during a recent tussle with another falcon, and though he appears to be slowly recovering, the burden of feeding their four chicks has lain primarily on the female.  No matter, as there are ample numbers of pigeons about — as she demonstrated to us earthbound onlookers, snatching a nearby bird when the flock was disrupted by a passing ship.  She circled above one of the calling juveniles, who snagged her prize out of mid air and retreated to the bridge to devour it.

I can’t say the background does much for the Grosbeak’s plumage, but I had some big gobs of Yellow Ochre and Paynes Gray left in my watercolour tray from a previous work and felt the urge to use them.

Loki, my three month old Dusky Parrot and practionioner of the hallowed psittacine philosphy of “everything can be eaten,” decided to taste-test one of those aforementioned paint gobs.  His beak looks a little blacker than usual in this photo.  Good thing watercolour isn’t toxic.

Paint looks delicious. It isn't