Elephant Butte Lake State Park

On the Friday morning of our trip to New Mexico, our tour was on a houseboat at Elephant Butte State Park. We were glad that the high winds from the day before had died down – although once we were out on the lake the breeze made for a cold time photographing birds! The movement of the boat also presented a challenge too. We saw Western Grebes near the dock and out on the lake; the picture below is near the dock.

The picture below is of a Clark’s Grebe (there is white in front of the eye and the bill is brighter yellow). Note that the water is a lot rougher in this picture….it was out on the lake.

There were American coots near the dock as well and some were close enough to photograph while the morning sun was still coloring the water.

Brewer’s Blackbirds frequented the dock area too. This male posed on gate – making it easy to photography him calling and staring at me!

American White Pelicans were out and about on the lake. They were very far away so I was using the zoom on my camera to photography them.

After I got back to hotel and looked at my pictures on a larger screen, I noticed one of the ‘pelican pictures’ had cormorants in it!

There were cormorants on one of the mounds of tires used as breakwaters around the docks. Note the Clark’s Grebe in the picture too.

After returning to the dock and having lunch, we headed out to the park below the dam. Evidently the area is usually teaming the birds but all we saw the day we were there was a male Pyrrhuloxia – and I was frustrated that this was the best picture I could get. He definitely was not posing for us.

It was a good day trip – and very different from our experience at Bosque del Apache.

Ten Days of Little Celebrations – September 2016

This September includes some unique ‘little celebrations.’ Two of them occurred in Florida.

OSIRIS REx successful launch. This was only my second time to see a launch (Kennedy Space Center/Cape Canaveral). I can’t imagine that every launch I attend will not make it to the celebration list!

Pelicans. I don’t remember every seeing American white pelicans before…or if I did I didn’t realize what I was seeing. They were the highpoint of the drive around Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge for me.

Happy ‘what if’ thoughts. Both my daughter and son-in-law are close to finishing their graduate work and looking at post docs. September was the first month that there seemed to be a potential ‘what next’ and we all spun all kinds of ‘what if’ scenarios. The celebration will get bigger when we actually settle on a plan – which might not finalize until early spring 2017.

There were things that were not entirely unique – but not things that happen frequently either:

4 hikes with three and four year old children. I was very excited and keyed up while I hiked with each of the groups (about 10 children and 4 adults in each group) talking about trees in the fall and seeds. I celebrated when they were done (I was exhausted) but even more than I’d managed to connect. It was probably my best grandmother-in-training experience to date!

Stream assessment with high schoolers. Putting on boots…checking water quality…identifying macroinvertebrates….with high schoolers that are interested in what they are finding --- celebrating the fall day in the stream as much as I did.

Hummingbird moth. I’m not sure why – but I don’t see hummingbird moths all that frequently. I didn’t see one at all last year. And then there was one at Brookside earlier this month. Celebration (and lots of pictures).

Chipmunk in the garden. I heard some rustling noise in the dried leaves under then bushes then looked around….and saw the chipmunk looking up at me from the end of the drain tube from the sump pump. Yes – chipmunks are rodents…but they are the cutest ones as far as I’m concerned and I celebrate that they survive in my front flower bed.

And then there are the normal things that happen frequently enough…but that I still celebrate when they do:

A rainy day after a long string of hot and dry days. All the plants seem to be celebrating too.

Abundant fall veggies. I celebrate the amount – the colors – the flavors. The harvest time is a special kind of celebration.

Celebration being home. Every time I am away for a few days…or even a week…I celebrate returning. The ‘no place like home’ sentiment rings true for me.

Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge – Part 1

While we were in Florida earlier this month for the OSIRIS-REx launch, we spent a little time at the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge although it was too hot to spend as long as we did before and after the Maven launch back in 2013 (posts from November 2013: Roseate Spoonbills, Brown Pelicans, Alligators, Bald Eagles, Osprey, beach). The Black Point Wildlife Drive was not open until mid-September so we 1) stopped at the visitor center, 2) checked the Manatee Observation Deck and the Bairs Cove boat ramp and 3)drove down the Bio Lab Road….and saw quite a lot in a couple of morning hours. I had a hard time narrowing down the pictures I want to share so am doing it in two posts instead of one!

I didn’t see any alligators (it was warm enough that they were not basking on the sides of waterways…they are harder to spot when only their eyes are out of the water) but we did see some reptiles near the visitor center: cooter turtles

And a lizard (that posed on a sign!).

My attention was drawn to leaves. There are so many plants in Florida that don’t grow in Maryland.

And then there were the birds. The osprey seemed to be everywhere. Many times the white head fooled me into thinking the bird was a bald eagle until I took a closer look. One was precarious perched on a pine branch over water near the bridge over the haul over canal between Bairs Cove and the Manatee Observation Deck.

We saw another along the Bio Lab Road…with feathers ruffled from the wind.

The wildlife refuge is right next to Cape Canaveral…can you spot the heron is this picture with the Vehicle Assembly Building in the background? It’s just below and to the left of the building images…stating on a small island of vegetation.

Here its after I zoomed in as much as I could. It’s probably a Great Blue Heron.

There were tri-color herons as well.

Ibis were feeding in the distance.

But the American White Pelicans were by far the most numerous birds that we saw. They winter here and must have just arrived recently. There was a film crew on the Bio Lab Road that was filming the birds as a helicopter swept overhead and caused them to fly up several times. I got a reasonable picture of them in flight as well.

A little further along the road were some black vultures. We saw them soaring every day we were in Florida and, a few times, they were cheekily grouped on the ground. We stopped for them…let them go at their own pace.

More of my Merritt Island photography tomorrow ----