I heard from a friend that along the river where I found the Owlets there was a family of Wood Ducks so, I went to check it out and sure enough I found some of them. My friend said there were 6 chicks, but I only saw 3.
I hope the others were just napping.
Here’s the male…aka Dad Wood Duck. Isn’t he a beautiful duck!
Here’s Mama. It looks like I caught her just after her bath. It must have been a fast one b/c now she’s after the chicks making sure they’re alright.
Here’s the first chick I spied. This is the only chick I was able to get a decent image of as the other two stayed in the reeds.
Wood Duck Fun Facts:
Natural cavities for nesting are scarce, and the Wood Duck readily uses nest boxes provided for it. If nest boxes are placed too close together, many females lay eggs in the nests of other females.
Wood Ducks pair up in January, and most birds arriving at the breeding grounds in the spring are already paired. The Wood Duck is the only North American duck that regularly produces two broods in one year.
The Wood Duck nests in trees near water, sometimes directly over water, but other times over a mile away. After hatching, the ducklings jump down from the nest tree and make their way to water. The mother calls them to her, but does not help them in any way. The ducklings may jump from heights of over 50 feet without injury.
The oldest recorded Wood Duck was a male and at least 22 years, 6 months old. He was banded in Oregon and found in California.
After having to postpone a trip to California to do some birding with friends 2 times due to weather I was finally able to cross the mountains and make that meetup last weekend.
We had a lovely day weather wise. It was sunny, not windy, and thankfully not muddy from all the rain and flooding the area had had.
On my way to meet the group I stopped at a refuge along the way just after daybreak to see if there were birds on the pond. There were hardly any but, oh, it was pretty.
Colusa National Wildlife Refuge Platform pond.
I wanted to drive the auto route to see what birds were in the other ponds but, every thing beyond the platform pond was closed due to flooding. I hung around for a bit hoping some more birds would fly in, but the birds that were flying overhead kept on flying…I wondered where they were headed since it wasn’t this lovely pond they were headed for? What was wrong with this pond?!!
I left to meet up with my friends at Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge just up the road about 20 miles.
I took just over 700 hundred images but, after my first culling I have a smidge over 200 keepers, and quite a few of those are duplicates that will require a second culling to really hone it down and free up much needed disk space. That second culling is so hard. Do you find it as hard as I do to let go of those? I feel like I need those as back up images! It’s nuts I know especially as I have a two fold backup system in place for my images and yet…it’s so hard to let some of those duplicates go!
I’ve only processed two of my images so far. The top image in this post and this Red-Shouldered Hawk. I had to work so hard for its image. I was driving around the auto-route and this bird was on the passenger side of the road way up high at the top of this dead snag. I couldn’t see it from my seat. I had to reposition my car kinda kaddy wompass, and hope no one else came up behind me while Gordon a fellow blogger from https://undiscoverdimagesamongstus.wordpress.com/who was in the back seat and I photographed this bird.
I have a console between bucket seats in the front so I wasn’t able to slide over to get my camera out the window. Lemme tell ya this wasn’t an easy shot. I wanted to be where Gordon was… in the back seat just then. 😀 It was worth the effort though. Isn’t it handsome! fyi- We’re not allowed outside of our cars while on the auto-route. There are a few spots where we are but this spot wasn’t one of those.
Red-Shouldered Hawk
I don’t see this bird very often so I was very happy to get a decent image of it.
It was good birding but, there were fewer birds than have been at this refuge in past years at this time of year. I’m guessing they know something we don’t and maybe winter will be ending sooner than we think and the birds have been heading home to the north already. I hope that’s it anyway.
It was even better hanging out with dear friends while birding. I hope it’s not too long before we can get together again. We’re hoping for a February trip. Fingers crossed that happens!
I’ll be working on more images from this trip to share too but, if you know me it may be awhile before more images from this trip make it to the blog.
Oh, we have a big event in our family this week. Littlest will be 4 years old this week! Time flies! He’s still really into Dinosaurs, but he’s moving into the Superhero phase, and #1 Grandson has him into Pirates and Colonial American characters as well, but his birthday party theme is Legos! #1 Grandson got him into those as well. Aren’t big brothers the best!! 💗
Baby Girl sent this image of him with a couple of his birthday party decorations. He LOVES that Lego head…so does #1 Grandson! 😜
What’s happening in your life this week, any plans, events, or something new going on?
On Thursday I heard them practicing and went to sit out back on my patio and watch them. I saw they were in camera range so grabbed my camera and made rather a lot of images. Here’s just one from my patio.
Blue Angels Over Minden, NV
On Friday I went to a secret spot and photographed them practicing for the week-end show. Here’s one of my favorite shots. An upside down Lunar Flyby.
Blue Angels Lunar Flyby
Flying in Moon image is #1 Capt. Brian C. Kesselring, USN, in #3 is Lt. Scott Goossens, USN, in #7 is LCDR Griffin Stangel, USN, and in #2 is LCDR Chris Kapuschansky, USN.
They’re so much fun to watch! I have oodles of images, because I went back to the secret spot on Saturday, and photographed some more. Hoping to pick up some shots I missed. So, you may be seeing images of from these 3 days for awhile.
He-Man and I are beginning to explore a bit more of our new home state of Nevada this time we spent a couple of days in Elko County exploring Lamoille Canyon in the Ruby Mountains. While on the scenic highway I spied this beautiful little church and had to stop for a photo or two.
Lamoille Presbyterian Church
From the church’s website found here they say the congregation had its first church service in Lamoille in 1872, and in 1890 the Organization of the First Presbyterian Church of Lamoille was established.
In 1905 they layed the first cornerstone for the building.
Since then it has gone through some changes and even closed for a time because of a decline in population and non use. It came back though and has been restored and had a second addition added in 1983, and in 2005 the community celebrated its 100th anniversary!
Closer look at the DoorLamoille Presbyterian Church
Hello! I’m back from taking a short blogging break. I have a few exciting things to share but, I haven’t been able to turn my mind to writing about them or processing my images yet. When I got home from my latest trip I came home to find #1 Grandson here for a summer visit!! He’s staying until next week then we’ll take him home. His school resumes in late August! It seems like summer is going by too fast. Already it’s dark here by 8:30 P.M.!
I’m so far behind processing and sharing images I fear I’ll never catch up, but let’s go back to my trip to Illinois which was in July this year. The day after my son’s wedding I went birding and He-Man came along for the walk, while we were at The Little Red Schoolhouse Nature Center I ran into a birder and we got to chatting about birds we’d each seen so far that morning, and I asked him if he’d seen any Northern Cardinals in the area and he said he had just up the trail!! We were off on the hunt. It wasn’t long too long after that I saw a red streak fly by in the trees ahead. I raced forward, He-Man raced forward as now he too was excited and on the hunt!! I saw it dive into the bushes but, couldn’t see it then suddenly it flew up to a dead tree snag and perched!!!
Northern Cardinal-Male
I’ve been dreaming of seeing this bird for what seems my whole life…more so since I started birding more seriously in 2010. Can you see me doing my happy dance? 💃💃 I still am so excited to have finally see this beautiful bird! One day I hope to see the Female so that’s still on my list.
Northern Cardinal-Male
I saw one other “Lifer” here at this Nature Center that I’ll be sharing soon, and I’ll be telling you all about my trip to Wyoming where I met up with Janet from This, That, and the Other Thing!!
I hope this finds you all well, you have a wonderful week-end!
Fuji X-T3| Fujinon 100-400mm @ 400mm| PS CC 23.4.2
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