There is a saying here in the south...If you don't like the weather just wait a minute... notice the difference! ON that day we had the same system that caused the landslides hit here and made everything wet! It poured for about 12 hrs and then the cold front came along and now it's more normal for Jan. Last night 24 and today will be high in 50's that's more our normal for this time of yr...that heat wave lasted one day but it was warm in the house, 70! In fact it got so humid I had to put the AC on for about an hr. And this afternoon, Wednesday as I'm writing this blog to post in 2 days, it is snowing! My house is creaking from all the contraction and expansion!
With the weather being so crazy all my outside projects are in a holding pattern, (i took my dryer apart and it needs to be put back together SOON before I forget what goes where) so I went in search of another bird last Saturday at Parr Reservoir, meeting up with my sis for an afternoon of catching up and scanning a very cold lake...We dipped on the Long Tailed Duck...but we were not the only ones dipping, this guy's boat got away from him and he had to take a dip in the icy water! Really felt sorry for him. Tip: do not launch your boat without a very long tow rope on it!
We had Pied-Billed Grebe, Bufflehead, Double Crested Cormorant, lots of Bonaparte's Gulls...and over on the other side at Lake Monticello 3 Horned Grebes, and lots of American Coots but all pretty distant views so I'll spare you the fuzzy photos...And this.
The VC Summer Nuclear Plant and right next to it the Failed $9 Billion expansion project! Hard working people have been overcharged on their electric bills to help pay for a project that has been ditched after the company went through $9 billion and the project was expected to need an additional $20 BILLION to complete it so the work stopped!! Yet the electric customers are still paying higher rates to the tune of $20 per month for the next 60 yrs! So customers are being charged to pay for something they never received and probably never will. The SC Congress has stepped in and they are trying to help fix this mess but I think they had a lot to do with why it failed in the first place. Electric customers have been promised a $1,000 rebate, but the reason for this failure is just pure greed and mismanagement of the project! It may be up to 8 years before they get those rebates, but 3 execs of the company were paid over $2 million each salary in 2016, as the project was failing they still got bonuses, and stock options!! The management turned in millions of dollars in expense reports that the SCANA refused to accept....like a $14,000 plane ride to pick up papers from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that could have been delivered by courier for a few bucks! This is what is wrong in America...one guy walked away with a retirement bundle of over $800,000 a yr plus a $2 million + dollar 401(k)...Okay I don't get it and I never will.
So back to the birds, a report came in for Greater Scaup at the Catawba River dam spillway...(thank you Steve Patterson)
So Tuesday I drove up Hwy 97 N from Camden, SC to Hwy 200 West and the bridge and dam are right there...so I found a spot to park on the other end behind the guard rail and hiked down under the bridge to the water's edge to scan for the birds.
The reflections under the bridge, the coolest thing!!
Right away I saw lots of Double Crested Cormorants and Ring Billed Bulls on the rocks sunning. No that is not white paint! And yet ebird said my count of 200 Cormorant was high....they have never seen these rocks...a couple of birds don't make this much staining. It's heavily used.
Lots of Cormorants periscoping on the surface..
And right out in front of everybody is the small flock of Greater Scaup...Yippie!
Males and females. The book says, look for a rounded head, with a green sheen to the face, a black tip on the bill end, a stocky neck, a cross hatched back, white sides extending to the primaries, and the female has a wide white band above the bill! I'd say this fits that description.
A shaky closeup they are pretty far away...
A lifer and one that has eluded me since my Florida trip in Feb of 2016, so I am really happy to be adding this sighting to my memory, and not just my list!
Back at the van, this Yellow-Rumped Warbler was all over me. Take my picture!! There was 3 others egging him on too.
yellow rumped (myrtle) warbler
Another fun day searching for the jewels in life, and I made a new friend he bellowed out a greeting!
HOWDY!
This post is a little shorter than my normal run off at the keyboard, so I wanted to add this little blurb to point y'all in the direction of this artist...you may already know all about him...Robert Wyland. I like his style, it's big, bold, bright and he has an environmental message of protecting our cherished oceans and ecosystems. His prices are way out of my league, but you can catch him painting on PBS they are now running Wyland's Art Studio series. I can't support him financially but I can spread the word...that there is another message out there coming from better messengers!
PEACE
Every day is a new Adventure.
Your weather is what we will get tomorrow and Sunday, with a little warm up in the mid 60's. Hope I remember to take some picture of the snow covered mountains in the area.
ReplyDeleteI'm so happy your found your birds. That sure is a big flock of all different breeds. Your list is really growing. I sure wouldn't want to touch those rocks.
Oh that poor man I sure hope he had a change of clothes in his truck and a darn good heater.
Snow on mountains is so much prettier than just the flat land we have it is pretty on trees but only a wet snow hangs on the trees...I hope that fellow didn't catch a cold from his icy dip!
DeleteAnd I thought that the UK had changeable weather. Some good spots there. Yes timber framed houses do creak with the weather. By the way I bought myself a Canon SX720, after seeing your pictures taken with a big zoom lens, still getting to grips with it.
ReplyDeleteWOW...Good for you that's a super nice camera! It won't take you long to figure it out until you do just shot on Auto and experiment a little each time you use it... I look forward to your shots!! Canon is an excellent brand.
DeleteHello, Great photos! I have seen tons of Cormorants hanging around the dam here. The fishing must be great for them there. Great sightings of all the ducks. I love the donkey at the end. Very cute. Enjoy your day and weekend!
ReplyDeleteHi Eileen! I found a field full of donkeys..and they started to bray very loud when I stopped...they are great guard dogs. I was happy to find the Gr. Scaup!
DeleteCongrats on the scaup -- you seem to find a new bird every time you go out! Wish I had half your birding karma -- and skill! Weird weather you've got -- us too; it has been really cold (furnace weather, yuk). It's warming up now though.
ReplyDeleteThat guano on the rocks is the reason I am not crazy about cormorants. They killed a beautiful stand of trees on the coastal river where we used to boat (in Oregon).... I wish they would spread out a little instead of gathering so tightly in one place.
I guess it changes the PH of the water and the ground around it...I want to be in Texas or Florida right now...but the weather is so not good can't just leave my house and mom's house with no one to put the heat on and off, or we will end up with frozen pipes and dead house plants. Everyone has moved away and I'm such a hermit I don't make new friends easily.
DeleteI think that every part of the world has a little saying about the weather. In England they say that if you read the newspaper you miss summer!
ReplyDeleteHaha...oh yes, my X used to tell me they only bathed once a week cause it was too cold!! He is from Warrington.
DeleteOh yay on the scaup! Thanks for sharing the nuclear plant story too. It's sad how much crap like that happens.
ReplyDeleteI finally get the difference between lesser and greater now that I've seen the Greater!...and on the news today the company is trying to back out of paying back the money they took from customers...how can "we the people" keep up at this rate? Soon we will be back in the dark ages. I think I will buy some batter powered lights and put them away for when the real Zombie Apocalypse hits.
DeleteGreat to get the Scaup, it's a bird i've never seen. What a mess the nuclear plant sounds :(
ReplyDeleteI was happy to see these Scaup I think they left the next day with a cold front.
DeleteThey say it will cost $15 Million to keep it UP so it could be finished in the future? SO they plan to maintain it in this state? Anyone who reads my blog knows I am all about reusing, recycling, and repurposing...so all this waste to me is like I can't even wrap my mind around it.
It is obscene isn't it, such a huge waste in so many ways!
DeleteGreed seems to dominate life. Disgusts me. Yay for yet another lifer! You’re going to run out of them, soon! I have what I believe to be Henslow Sparrows, but I want to back one more time before I feel confident about that.
ReplyDeleteOHHH how cool Henslow's I wanna seeeeee.
DeleteI don't think I'll ever run dry of new birds to see, my bank account however probably will...lol
I'm thinking a Go Fund Me Birding Acct. what do you think? Haha...Imagine if I had that 9 billion's worth of waste to go birding with...and If I gave 90 of my friends $100 million and they gave 90 of their friends half of what I gave them, and so forth we'd all be doing great eh? I'm all for wealth distribution.