It's Life

The weather has been extortionary this week however it's the week gas went to $4.10 a gallon.  Nothing by European standards, but to us here it's a hard blow, especially when you drive a gas hog like my van! So I kept my little adventure trips to a minimum. I think I may need to take in a little burro for future transport plans! 

So here's some photos of one out and about and some things I saw....and I will adlib some commentary about my week.  

 

This Red Tailed Hawk has half a tail...the Grackle was in hot pursuit Life is not always peaches n cream

Monday morning at 1:32 AM awoke to an Earth Shaking  sound of a train swiftly approaching faster than the speed of sound and the windows rattling...Earthquake 3.3 on the scale! Yes this area about 15 miles to my west has been the epicenter for many tremors and quakes since December, this one was the largest, followed the next night by a 2.9 after shock.

Imagine being a Cliff Swallow and your home is made out of mud...there is only one way to pick up that mud if you're a bird and that is in your MOUTH! Yuk...and all. 

When gathering mud to reinforce their gourd shaped homes the Cliff Swallow keeps his wings high out of the muck, pretty good idea!  Below  a group of Double Crested Cormorants stand atop the old Dam built in 1920...Just a few miles north of the epicenter of the Quake

This is from the water holding side of the dam...it's 3 ft below full and the lake is 64 feet deep....and covers 13,700 acres. How strong would the Quake need to be to destroy this dam? Its pretty thick at the bottom...but you can see it has cracks!

I have been  sawing up a big limb that fell out of a large dead Pine at my place...it also came down with lots of small twigs, and branches...I had it neatly stacked into a pile of large pieces and the rest I picked up and put into four large bins that took a half day to do...I used the lawn tractor with the trailer behind, put all the bins and the wood into the trailer, moved that to the van and onto the cargo rack that I put on back,  it holds 500 lbs of cargo. Tied it all on,  Spent the entire morning doing that...then unloaded  it at the solid waste center and put it in the Yard Waste bin...got back about 1 pm sat down to relax and I hear a huge crash outside...Look out wondering....

 Another Large limb fell  even bigger than the one I just removed...it will take me 10 yrs at this rate to eventually remove the 100 foot, 3.5ft diameter dead Pine!

This common Grackle has caught a lizard for his lunch...
Lizard is saying "and  you thought you had it hard."

The Squirrels destroyed my new hummingbird feeder, they chewed off all the perches, pulled out the bee stoppers and chewed holes in them...so I have been relocating squirrels to the forest where they can live a truly wild life without human interference.  So far six Seven gone, all males.  If I catch a nursing female she is not relocated...but so far it's all  males.  

This goes to show how critters learn to use what man or woman has put in their neck of the woods to their best advantage...with all this manmade stuff in the way an Osprey still builds a nest and raised young. 

A Grackle finds a bi-valve and eats the small clam inside...

Then the Great Blue Heron chases after the Grackle...

A fish is given a very amazing view of the world as he is flown around right before becoming a meal....I hope he was amazed by the sight...pretty good send off I guess..

 you can tell I am in a sarcastic mood...Sometimes you really have to see the sarcasm in life in order for it to make any sense at all...

PEACE

Every day is a new Adventure.

Field Trips!

..literally in Fields! 

I've been out and about alone socially distanced as normal for me to places a couple or less hours away and continuing to get more hiking in while our weather is still nice and cool. That intro means this post is gonna be just stuff I saw here and there!  More mixed media, hodge-podge and hopefully move me closer to real time!

 April 14th, I visited Carolina Sandhills and I saw this Wild Turkey standing by the lake and before he realized I was there he moseyed around enjoying his time feeding...it almost looks like a starry night...

On that same day I checked out this Eastern Bluebird house number 30 while looking for some grassland/verge birds and here is how that went...

press play...

One of the fields I checked was so pretty on that day...the light and the rolling hills it was breath taking...and then a few days later in the County Riverside Park reopened so I visited there...the fields were alive with yellow...

There is a river here and a bridge...under that bridge Cliff Swallows have a breeding colony...There is a lot of traffic noise as cars pass overhead so I lowered the volume on this video... of a couple residents! 

Near the edge of the field in the trees, I found a very difficult American Restart, he refused to come down to my level....so very hard to get a good look at this magnificent migrant.  

He is black, orange, yellow and white!  I wish I could have seen more than his belly!  

Then I took a hike to Lake 12 at the Refuge on April 28th.  

This is a Summer Tanager another beautiful migrant, the female is calling in the background...I think this is  her young he looks like a juvenile. 

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Near the end of April,  I took a hike in a field of wildflowers...it was so amazing, except my socks got filled with all sorts of prickly stuff...took me an  hour to pick it all out...

                                                       Variegated Fritillary

Coreopsis

Eastern Kingbird hunting for moths and butterflies, ut-oh

Field Wildflowers up close

Female Commom Yellowthroat hunting insects, while I hunt for birds to enjoy...

Oxpen Lakes Area found out there is a game camera mounted for a direct view of where I stood and readjusted my clothing...OMG! Don't ever take for granted you are not being watched...I thought about confiscating the camera but really it was pretty far away but my point is there is no escape the prying eyes of mankind.

Thistle seedhead...

A Common Nighthawk took to the sky in broad daylight!

The telling white bars on the oversized wings 

Around the first of May,  a wetland I check on a weekly basis in my 5 mile radius, gave me a beautiful Prothonotary Warbler, he flew right at me, I may have inadvertently been close to a nest..

Beaverdam Creek Wetland (I named this wetland it has no official name) is the place I filmed the Pileated Family. 

I found one leucistic Indigo Bunting had me fooled for a minute but his back still had most of the normal color I see...

May 1st, I went to bird one more of my unbirded counties...so glad I chose the place I did....and You'll have to wait till next time to learn about my visit to Lynches River County Park, in Florence County. I drove the rural roads to get there which I enjoy doing when I am able to make it work...

...and I see many scenes like this I call these the Tobacco Roads....It's reminiscent to find old homesteads like this still in use...much like my Grandma's farm back in TN.  Of course its not like it was, it was modernized and in my opinion that destroyed it.  Many homesteads like this still stand in rural counties complete with contents I WOULD love to do a walk thru and just go back in time s simpler way of life where at the end of the day you felt like you had done your best to survive and you had that feeling of life is good.  

So that's up next!  We had a couple rain days so Im posting a mid week extra post in an attempt to catch up soon the weather will become sticky and I probably won't be out and about as much but we'll see!

PEACE

Every day is a new Adventure.