Monday 8 July 2013

Thanks for "Showing up"! Some time in the next week I expect to pass the 10,000 view mark! (20130706)

I'd like to thank everyone who has visited the "blog" over the past 20 months. As mentioned in the title sometime this week the blog counter for visits will "rollover" the 10,00 visit mark. I have "learned" that folks come to view the photo's. If you look back at earlier posts you will see that the number of images were minimal, one or two per post. Now I try to keep them down to 10 or less, but on the occasion where I have an exceptional outing, or we are out for an extended period of time I will post a "supplemental" just to include some additional images.
This is one of those supplemental posts. This the drive home portion of the trip Dan and I took to the lake on Saturday. We spotted this Swainson nest on the way to one of the other areas that I wanted to show Dan.
At the "south basin" of the lake we found another pile of shore birds like Stilts, Phalaropes, and even a Dowitcher.  Just like Charlie Brown, "I got a rock", actually another Killdeer.
Okay, here is a long distance shot of the Long Billed Dowitcher.
As we were driving along, we were discussing the habitat of Long Billed Curlew's. As we drove down one section of road, I said "I wouldn't be surprised to find a Curlew on this road", and sure enuff!
She was squawking  and leading us back up the road, when Dan spotted the youngster which had broken cover.
Of course this time of your we are always able to find Wilson Snipes on the fence posts.
We happened across a pair of juvenile Upland Sandpipers (one in each wheel track)  so Dan and I each had our own bird to shoot :) My first of the year.
This road ended at a large pond where we scoured with the binoculars for exceptional birds, but found none of note. On the drive out the road Dan spotted this Uplander on the post, on my side of the road. he took much better shots than I as he was able to get out of the truck and have the Canola field as a background.
Our next find was in wintering GHO country. We spied this Redtail nest with three fledglings,  rare find for me.The one on the left looks considerably larger than the other two.
We were able to find a few more Ibis on one of the ponds I am aware of, but they were pretty unapproachable. Here is a poor image.
Dan wanted us to chase down a Bobolink and Turkey vulture that had been reported out by Millarville, so we were off on the search. While we didn't find them, we did find this Red Necked Grebe still on her nest.
This little spot also had an abundant group of Black Terns. These to me are very difficult birds to shoot successfully due to their colouration. The black, white and greys are difficult to capture in a photo.
This will be a pond that I will return to, in hopes of getting some better photos. This will wrap up this post, and perhaps produces the images that will attract my 10,000th viewer. Have a great Wildlife week!
Turbo

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