Still summer here...hope for a sudden change!
Another hot one...
...enjoyed this fresh looking dragon, I guess it's a Halloween Pennant dragonfly He looks perfect! We rode over to Lake Paul Wallace, It's been a while since we visited we didn't see a lot but we enjoyed what we saw...
Duck Potato Plant
These Mallards wanted a hand out we had a few crumbs so we tossed a bit out of the window..they are completely spoiled as you can tell
The Geese were not as friendly!
Aug 21
Midweek I ventured up to the local racetrack...it is also a hotspot for my town, it's not in my radius and I helped push the county count up by 4 for the year, I know in a way I'm cutting my own throat for my radius percentage %.
This little pond is on the racetrack grounds and it's pretty popular...I uploaded some of these straight to Blogger see if you can click it and make it bigger, if you don't mind? A little test.
So last week Aug 14th I went over and found the immature Tri Color Heron, and this week he was still there along with the 2 immature White Ibis I shared last post...
Tri-Color Heron
and all of sudden he had company...lower left of the photo
A spotted sandpiper! Fun to find both of these...
So 2 more added to my county list for the year
When I stand very still for a long period of time my spine fuses up! So I was glad to sit on one of these logs and watch the birds milling around in the pond...
Tuesday Aug 20, I went to my 5 mile radius Hotspot early I arrived about 7:30 am and I found a new one for the radius, the Green Heron. (#117) He was pretty far out there I got this for the record shot no mistaking this silhouette.
And he returned again Aug 21....the Green Heron
This is hopeful thinking! Im glad to see some color coming to the landscape..
One of the Common Yellow Throats came out into the open
Aug 21, Back at the Racetrack Pond, I found another Green Heron, he was really small so I assume a this years edition.
The little Blue Heron continues to hang around even tho the pond is slowly drying up...I hope recent rains will help...
The Green Heron was having luck finding food I saw him come up with several wiggly things...mostly what this pond has in it is this:
Lots of small peepers! They scampered from the edge as I walked along making little bloopppp sounds as they hit the water.
So the cool thing is this...The Racetrack has been the number one Hotspot in our county. (per ebird) There are only about 10 birders, actually only 2 of us record active weekly counts, since one fellow moved away. So I have moved my Hotspot, Goodale State Park, to within 3 birds of being tied with the Hotspot for species count for the current yr...it was 4th in past yrs. So that's really cool. I honestly believe I can take it to number 1.
Red Eyed Vireo (taken with my old camera) at my hotspot Aug 23.
AND...
I decided not to keep the camera I just purchased, its on the way back...I decided I wanted better results and realized it was not coming... once I get refunded for that I will be looking again! I have my eye on a couple possibilities.
8/24 ...on the way to the post office this morning, and a Barred Owl (#118) glided across the road in front of my van...In the Radius! I stopped he had landed but he was in deep cover when I got out of the van and tried to relocate him he flew into even deeper cover, I've been finding feathers so I know one is active here. Then I stopped at my hotspot and finally; I've been waiting for these guys to arrive..
#119 the Wood Stork, 2 in total. So this was a good day for me birdwise.
SO that's a wrap up for my week. Hope yours was a good one!
In honor of Judy a birding blogger who recently passed...
THE END:
the south end of the red eyed vireo
PEACE
