January 2nd, 2016

What? I went outside again and I found some birds!

Summer Lake

Male Hooded Merganser

Great Blue Heron.... Yeah, he's cold.

Female American Wigeon

Greater White-fronted Goose

Another Greater White-fronted Goose

A Greater White-fronted Goose getting mad at a Cackling Goose

A Cackling Goose leading a parade of Canada geese

Female Common Mergansers

Duck butt, Goose butt

It was also great fun seeing some friends from out of town!

Ocotber 4th, 2015

We went out to Rood Bridge Park to take photos around sunset. Turns out we were too late to get the reflection photos I wanted..... but there were other cool things.

This flower thing:

The following photos are pretty grainy. It was getting dark so I had to crank up my ISO pretty high, like 2500....

Along came a muskrat juvenile nutria !

It spotted me.

But it had a friend come along so it decided to stick around.

They are such elegant creatures.

No really they are!

Grass is a tasty snack!

And these two muskrats juvenile nutria are best friends!

While we were watching the muskrats juvenile nutria a heron came along.

Here is the reflection photo I did get today:

The best part of today? I found a woolly bear!!

May 9th, 2015

Today's flowers at Summer Lake Park:

And the birds!

This goose was mad that I was standing on the bank where it wanted to get out of the water. It hissed at me.

Do you remember those eight little goslings? I am pretty sure these are the same ones, a little more grown up. There were many more geese with babies, but this was the only group of eight.

Mom was unimpressed with my proximity to her babies.

I was glad to see that the Heron came back from where ever Herons go when they aren't in their ponds.

Hope you have a great night!

January 14th, 2015

I had this feeling that I needed to go back to Summerlake Park, so I did. I am really glad I went.

Yesterday, I saw these chew marks but didn't photography them, but I did think, beaver!! I was very excited at the prospect of seeing a beaver. I looked around the area but didn't see a dam.

I asked Jen what she thought. She told me that nutria will chew trees like beavers. I had no idea.  I kept an eye out for nutria around the lake, but I should have looked behind me. This nutria walked down the hill and went though all the duck like I wasn't even standing there.

It exited the water just a few feet from where I stood and just looked at me.

It seems to have a small wound near its eye.

Yeah, I guess those could chew down a tree....

It turns out the Great Blue Heron was not a statue after all. It was only pretending so it could find some food.

I saw these little birds yesterday and didn't get a good photo of them. Turns out this isn't some sort of duck! It is an American Coot.

It has creepy red eyes.....

These are male American Wigeons.

I think this is a little song sparrow.

And this might be a non-breeding male house sparrow.

The crows were very active at Summerlake. The other parks I have been too haven't had as many crows.

He was yelling at a cat on the porch, the cat didn't care.....

This is my favorite picture from today!

There were many American Robins out today!

And this Varied Thrush was digging though the leaves with his best girl.

Jen said it was pretty rare to see these birds out in the open.

It was such a neat trip to the park. I feel so lucky that I get to interact with wild animals so close to my house!. It is amazing to have these parks in urban areas.

Hope you have a great night!