Bull frogs,Silver darter, Common Yellowthroat (20150703) A run to the old hunting grounds.

We took possion of our new home on June 22, and the moving truck arrived the next day so we have been busy with getting the house contents situated. Finally I managed to secure a day for the woods and a beutiful day it was. Len had wanted to take me up to an area where he and my father had hunted 20 years ago. A day of exploring, and putting my eyes on places I had only heard about, what could be better? It's an hour's run north or better. A quick stop to get rid of some morning tea and we found this guy, a bird that is quickly becoming a standard in our outings. Another great B&W!

We took a little stroll down one of the former side roads. It was pretty heavily grown in, but it turned out to be pretty productive. Our first encounter was with this little female Common Yellowthroat.

On the same old road way there was a water filled ditch, and it was filled with singing bull frogs.

We probably found about 15 different frogs in this ditching, they all had their own little territory staked out, and were all pretty well hidden.

I was thinking of Kerri the whole time. I believe she would have an absolute ball checking these beauties out. After about 10 minutes we found the bully that was making the loudest and deepest calls. He would be king of the pond, and would probably weigh in at about 10-12 ounces.

We also found Grey Jays in there but couldn't get a good image. As our drive progressed we just missed a turtle. I saw it as it slid off its log and into the water. we waited around for a bit and did a little stroll in the area of the pond. There were a lot of red dragon flies and some whitish/silver ones like this.

There were also a lot of these flowers in the wetter sections. I think they may be some form of water Iris. I will need to get some better images of these fine looking flowers in the upcoming years.

I think we may have spotted a Bobolink, but I regret not going back to check. Our final subject of the day was this little Purple finch. He was pretty flighty so the shot is pretty far off.

Overall a super day!  Thanks to brother Len for acting as guide and providing a running commentary:)  Hey, grab your brother, sister or buddy and put a little "wild" in your life!
Turbo