Happy National Draw A Bird Day, today, April 8, 2013! 

April 8 is Draw a Bird Day 

It all started in 1943 when a little girl went to visit her uncle in the hospital…. Not an official holiday, but one with a special sentiment originating in England in memory of Dorie Cooper, a 10-year-old who was killed after being struck by a car - but not before the walls of a hospital ward had been filled with hand-drawn images of birds by wounded soldiers. 
Today, Draw A Bird Day (story at the link) is celebrated world-wide as a way to express joy in the simplest things in life. 

While shopping for planters this week, I came across this fabulous antique bird aviary. Wouldn’t it be lovely filled with houseplants in a conservatory? 

Gentiana catesbaei (Elliot’s Gentian), native perennial to the north- and southeastern United States, and Gallinua Americana (Soree). 

Mark Catesby, Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands (1754). 

Bunting (1900), Edwin Sheppard

Birds of Paradise (engraving), A History of the Earth and Animated Nature (1825) by Oliver Goldsmith. 

A Natural History of Birds (1743), G. Edwards. 

Cavity Nesting Birds. 

Young hawk on the gloved hand of a falconer (1873, watercolor), F.H. Salvin, Falconry in the British Isles.