Ten Little Celebrations – February 2021

The biggest celebrations of February 2021 were about my family surviving very cold weather in Missouri and Texas relatively unscathed…..and everyone staying well for another month. Of course – there were a myriad of little celebrations. I easily list one every day – and sometimes choosing what to record is a challenge!

There were more notations than usual about food in February. Some were experiments that were yummy…others were opportunistic:

Snow ice cream. We had enough snow this month to make snow ice cream. I always wait for the snow to get at least 3-4 inches deep…then collect the top inch for the snow ice cream. I collect a bowl full then add half and half, chipped peppermint candy/sugar, and vanilla. It’s one of the few times I use my old electric mixer! The challenge is to make only as much as my husband and I can consume right away…we usually each manage a large bowl full. …celebrating a snow day favorite

Broccoli  with orange marmalade glaze. When it’s cold outside, I rarely want salad….this experiment was an easy way to have a ‘hot’ equivalent. I cut up broccoli just as I would for salad, tossed it over a spoonful of orange marmalade in a bowl and microwaved it for a minute or so. A quick stir to coat the broccoli with the melted marmalade, and it was ready to eat! …celebrating ‘hot’ versions of salads

Microwave apple with oatmeal and pecans. I bought a large bag of apples that my husband did not like as well as I thought he would, so I was looking for ways to use them. Breakfast in a bowl seemed to be a good option. I put about ½ cup almond milk in a microwavable bowl then 1/3 cup oatmeal, some brown sugar and cinnamon, a cut up apple, some chopped pecans. Microwave for a minute….stir…microwave for another 30 seconds to a minute…and enjoy. I’ve had it for breakfast several times but realize it would taste good to me any time of day! ….celebrating a new ‘comfort food’

Hot chocolate smoothie. I like smoothies and started experimenting with heating them up. My favorite is made with almond milk, chocolate protein powder, cocoa, banana, and kale. I make it the usual way in the Ninja then put it in a Pyrex measuring cup to heat in the microwave. I stir is several times while I heat…it thickens a bit. ….celebrating a decadent (healthy) treat

There were photography entries on my list too….some attempts that produced images to celebrate.

Snowflakes. There were several snow day during the month so I got several opportunities. I learned to pay attention to the temperature; in general – lower is better! …celebrating the challenge of macro photography outdoors in the snow

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High key. This is an example of learning something new….being inspired…and lucky enough to create some interesting images almost immediately! …celebrating learning something new – well enough to be ‘dangerous’

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And then there was the variety in the rest of the list:

Multiple virtual birding festivals in one day: Niagara, Laredo, and Bosque del Apache. It was almost overwhelming. We ended up saving some of the webinars until the next day. I was not ‘in the field’ but something that would have been physically impossible: New York/Canada – Texas – New Mexico all in one day! …celebrating the wonders of virtual travel

Quiet snowy Sunday. Sometimes it’s good to have a day to just enjoy the scenery from our windows! …celebrating home

A warmer day in Maryland that Texas or Missouri. Texts were flying across states…the family checking in…worried about water pipes breaking or loosing electricity. My family was lucky enough to come through with relatively few problems! …celebrating family sharing during times of near/potential crisis.

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Curbside groceries. I have noticed how different it is from last spring. The shoppers are faster (probably more experienced) and the supply in the store is better. It will be wonderful to shop for my own groceries again but for now I am….celebrating the curbside pickup grocery service.

Crane Fiesta

We thoroughly enjoyed the virtual Crane Fiesta run by the Friends of Bosque del Apache. Checkout their website (bottom of the home page for a collection of short videos). The Facebook page of the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge has the morning fly out and even fly in recordings from during the festival.

I went back to look at my pictures from November 2016 and November 2018 when we enjoyed the Festival of the Cranes at Bosque. One of my favorite pictures is one I took the very first day in 2016; it shows that when the angle is just right – it is possible to see through the nares of the crane beak. It was a learning experience for me!

Here’s a slideshow with a few other 2016 pictures from around the refuge.

In 2018, I did some rapid bursts of pictures to capture sequences of crane take off. I picked individual pictures from several of those to include in the slideshow below. It was colder than in 2016 but we were better prepared – snow pants, hand and foot warmers, balaclavas…layers. On one of the mornings, we watched the cranes stepping very carefully on ice.

I already looking forward to the next time we can be at Bosque del Apache during the festival week…. maybe in 2021.

Gleanings of the Week Ending November 21, 2020

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Photography In The National Parks: The Redwood Forests Are Made For Vertical Shots – Botany (redwoods), photography (including two short videos), natural places…a great way to start the day or boost my mood any time.

Tarantulas: Color, Cancer and Cramps – I remember a tarantula on the sliding glass door of our house in Wichita Falls, TX when I was in my early teens…at eye level. Fortunately, it was on the outside and I was inside. It was about the side of the palm of my hand. This article talks about research on tarantulas; they are probably more interesting than scary!

The cheap pen that changed writing forever - BBC Future – A little history for the week. The ballpoint pen was unveiled on October 29, 1945 in the US. However – the first patent for a ballpoint pen was back in 1888. Laszlo Biro developed a practical ball point pen by perfecting the ink (different than ink used in fountain pens) and got a patent in 1938 in Britain but World War II came along, and he fled to Argentina. His pen was released in Argentina in 1943, but the pen was little-known outside of South America. Find out more from the article.

Biophilic Cities For An Urban Century – During the pandemic, I have appreciated where I live for its proximity to nature; I live at the edge of a forest and the 30 year old development has larger trees in the yards too. Turning our cities from gray to green would be different but there are reasons to make the choice to do it. The authors consider urban economics, environmental health, and ecology…and propose that going forward that we should actively design for biophilic cities. If cities were more like the first picture in this article (and all those cars below were electric) – they would be much more pleasant places to live!

Top 25 birds of the week: Wild Birds! – Can’t resist….I always enjoy the collection of bird photos every week…so include it in the gleanings list.

Slideshow: How Ecologists Study the World’s Apex Predators – Projects from around the world studying the impact of predators…using a variety of techniques.

New solar panel design could lead to wider use of renewable energy: Designing solar panels in checkerboard lines increases their ability to absorb light by 125%, a new study says -- ScienceDaily and Solar Panels + Agriculture: You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet – Two articles about solar panels….we’ve seen more of them in the past few years…there are a lot of indicators that it’s only the beginning of the upward trend gaining momentum.

The Craters on Earth – They mapped 200 sites – high resolution topographic maps and satellite images…geological descriptions and photographs…details of each impact event. I followed the links and found that publication is available for pre-order here; the page provides the table of contents and additional sample images.

How Cowbirds raise their young, without raising their young – We had a group of cowbirds at our feeder one day this week. They seemed to be moving through rather than staying. There were some last spring as well, but I didn’t notice any cowbird chicks coming to the feeder like I have in previous years.

Plastic-eating enzyme 'cocktail' heralds new hope for plastic waste -- ScienceDaily – It appears that we are getting closer to a cost effective was to endlessly recycle plastic – which would dramatically reduce the need to produce plastic from fossil fuels. It’s also a good example of the benefit of collaborative research – international…multiple specialties…sophisticated (and rare) equipment.

Unique Activities for Yesterday:

Bosque del Apache Sandhill Cranes. We are enjoying the Bosque del Apache Crane Fiesta. It started out with a live video of the morning fly-out of the cranes. The recording is now available on the Facebook page of the refuge….remember to turn on your speakers to listen to the birds and enjoy the sunrise (it starts out before sunrise and runs for more than an hour)!

We’ve been to the area twice in November for the Festival of the Cranes and we always enjoy photographing the cranes (and snow geese) each morning. I simulated it by taking screen snaps as I watched the live video. Enjoy my little slideshow…but watch the video from the refuge’s Facebook to get the full effect!

Festival of the Cranes – part 12

This is last post about our trip to New Mexico and Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge (unless my husband eventually wades through his photos and provides me some good owl pictures…or photos from when he went to the Very Large Array). Our last field trip of the festival was with a refuge biologist…to talk about endangered species they are providing habitat for. We spent the most time on the New Mexico Meadow Jumping Mouse which are already hibernating in November. Winter is the time of year when the refuge managers tweak the habitats to help the endangered species; for the mouse they provide areas for day nests, maternal nests, food (the mice like seeds on stalks), saturated soils. The mice can swim the irrigation canals but have problems climbing up steep banks…and avoiding the bull frogs there that can eat them!

We saw a Great Blue Heron in an area that will be reworked with the mouse in mind and it will be better for other wildlife as well.

The refuge has milkweed….and supports monarchs in season. The pods looked a little different than the common milkweed we have in Maryland…but I knew it was a milkweed relative as soon as I saw it.

The Southwest Willow Flycatcher is also a species they manage for. The bird will nest in salt cedar but the invasive plant is a fire hazard (burns very hot and fast); the refuge is removing it and encourages the native willows to return. That is the natural progression from grassy meadows in the area so there is some balance to helping the mouse (that needs meadow) and having good stands of willows for the flycatcher.

We went back to a part of the refuge not on the wildlife loop and saw turkeys.

One jumped over an irrigation ditch….the others went down into the ditch and back up rather than making the jump!

This field trip was the most detailed discussion of the festival about the behind the scenes work done on the refuge for the wildlife that makes this place home – for the whole year or just for part of the year.

Festival of the Cranes – part 11

After the fly out, we spent the rest of the morning driving slowly around the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge wildlife loop. We used our car as a blind since it was still cold, and we were seeing quite a lot right along the road. A meadowlark with plumped feathers posed for a portrait.

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A coyote crossed the road and continued to follow its nose. We never did see what the animal smelled.

A lesser goldfinch was eating seeds. The refuge leaves a lot of standing seed plants for birds like these.

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A pair of white crowned sparrows watched us from a snag.

The sandhill cranes were in the fields – enjoying the bounty of the refuge provides. Historically more of the cranes continued to Mexico but the Bosque’s management program provides reliable food for them through the winter…and the cranes stay.

We found our way back around to the flight deck ponds and got out to watch the birds on the water. We watched the mergansers, other ducks and snow geese. Something startled the snow geese and they all flew away except for one that was struggling in the water. At first, I thought it was somehow stuck in the mud because the bird seemed to be trying to take off. Then it had a muscle spasm and moved its head to point to the sky in an awkward way. Within a minute the bird was still. Later in the afternoon I found out that the bird had probably died of avian cholera. The snow geese on the refuge are plagued by this disease and the refuge managers collect carcasses as quickly as possible to control the infection, but it’s a challenge with the birds being in such proximity to each other on the ponds. There are instances where birds have died in flight.

It was a rather sad end to the drive around the wildlife loop but thought provoking. Refuges are not safe havens from disease and they are limited enough in size that congregations of birds are larger than they might have been before the diversion of the Rio Grande for other uses.

Festival of the Cranes – part 10

We got up early for the last day of the Festival of the Cranes at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge to see the flyout. There were more clouds on the east horizon than in previous days. They made for deeper color of the sunrise.

The water around the sandhill cranes that were just beginning to move around was tinged pink.

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A few begin flying away but most of them stayed put.

It was a cold morning and a thin layer of ice had formed on the water. I took a series of pictures of a crane carefully walking and breaking through the ice.

The morning light began to fade as the clouds blocked the sun. A juvenile sandhill crane seemed to pose for my camera. The redhead feathers of adulthood are still to come for this bird.

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I finally managed to capture the drama of the flock of snow geese leaving the pond. They swirl up into the air. Sometimes they come back to the same pond; other times they go somewhere else. I guess it depends on what caused them to fly up and out.

As cranes take off from the water – the legs are still down but they ‘point their toes,’ becoming more aerodynamic. I’m always in awe of how close together they can be and not get their wings tangled as they take off.

Finally – I took some pictures of a single crane surrounded by snow geese – head pointed up and vocalizing, flapping wings. Was the bird celebrating the morning, calling other cranes to join him, or just starting a normal crane day?

It was a good conclusion to the last fly out of this festival.

Festival of the Cranes – part 9

After the Raptor ID tour, we had lunch then rested at our hotel until time for the ‘fly in’ at sunset. It was the only day we managed to be available at that time.  We decided to observe from the ponds along the refuge’s wildlife loop. There were other people that had the same idea but not enough to make it crowded. There was a crowd of snow geese already on the water and feeding on shore as well. I find myself drawn to the blue morphs…just to see something other than white mounds.

By the time the sandhill cranes started coming in it was too dark to get good pictures at the water level. I took a few images with the evening light…birds – cliffs – trees.

Some Canadian geese were seeking their evening roost as well.

Right before we left – I too a picture of the moon…pretty good shot for a bridge camera on a monopod!

Ten Little Celebrations – November 2018

At the beginning of November, we had a short burst of color before the leaves fell off the trees. I celebrated a glorious fall day…wishing the season had not been so short this year.

HoLLIE (Howard County Legacy Leadership Institute for the Environment) graduation was this month after accumulating enough volunteer hours since finishing the class last spring.

And then came the Festival of the Cranes with so many little celebrations:

Seeing sandhill cranes in flight – being close enough to their fly out to hear the first few high-power flaps of their wings.

Seeing two barn owls circle above the field where I was standing. It was a first for me….so beautiful and ghost-like.

Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge. It was my first visit to the place and it’s hard to choose the high point maybe it was the screwbean mesquite the herd of pronghorn playing a running game with our caravan or seeing a shrike with a meal.

Hooded Mergansers. It was not the first time I had seen the birds (there were some on a local (Maryland) pond we visited during our 5th HoLLIE class). But they were not displaying like the birds we saw during the Festival of the Cranes.

Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge. What an amazing place….and great hosts to the Festival of the Cranes. I am already planning to go again! There are so many sights and sounds to celebrate here.

Home again. I celebrate returning every time I am away for longer than a couple days.

Bald Eagle seen from my office window. The morning we left to drive to Pennsylvania for Thanksgiving, a bald eagle flew over the forest behind our house while I was shutting down my laptop for the road trip. It continued over our house. Since I saw a pair of eagles soaring a nearby shopping center recently, I think perhaps their nest is somewhere in the forest along the Middle Patuxent River near us. What a way to start the Thanksgiving holiday!

Thanksgiving….celebrating the day…realizing how much I am thankful for.

New Mexico Earrings

There are still more Festival of the Cranes posts to come, but I am taking a break for a few days to do post on other topics….and to do a little history of our travels to New Mexico via my earring collection.

I have some New Mexico earrings from as far back as the 1970s but I’m going to focus this post on the ones I’ve collected this century.

I bought the pair of black and silver M design (like a pottery shard) at Bandelier National Monument in 2005. My husband, daughter, and I had met my parents in Albuquerque and used that as a base to see north central New Mexico: Santa Fe, Bandelier, Petroglyphs, and Chaco Canyon.

On a road trip between Dallas and Tucson, we stopped at White Sands National Monument in 2013. I posted about the barn swallows and yuccas!

During our first experience with Festival of the Cranes back in 2016, I bought some radio telescope earrings at the Very Large Array Radio Telescope,

Two pairs of earrings including some stylized cranes at Vertu, the local artist store in Socorro,

And three more pair in the Albuquerque airport.

I bought four pair of earrings this year during our second experience at Festival of the Cranes. Starting at 12 o’clock position: there are the polished stones purchased at Vertu (they are thin enough to not be heavy), the dragonfly in cattails at the Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge gift shop , the bird flying over water and mountains from a shop on Socorro’s square, and the mosaic type earrings at the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge made by an artist from the Santo Domingo Pueblo.

Overall – I don’t remember the years all that well (I must look back at notes), but I easily remember where I bought them. Earrings are still the best keepsake for me to buy, pack, and enjoy – savoring the memory from the time I bought them every time I see them.

Festival of the Cranes – part 8

After the fly out, we headed to the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge visitor center to meet the bus for a Raptor ID tour.

The refuge is home to many red-tailed hawks…several different morphs. The basic ‘football’ shape is what we were looking for in the trees.

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The bald eagle was in the snag in the middle of the flight deck pond. Nothing happened when the eagle opened its wings and moved all little (just as I snapped a picture…good enough to identify it as a bald eagle but not much else).

Later the bird suddenly flew away….and caused a cloud of snow geese to rise all at one time from the water’s surface.

There are a lot of northern harriers this year too. Every time we drove the wildlife loop, we saw a few. They fly low over the fields looking for their prey.

There were other birds that were not raptors that we saw too. The ravens seemed to pose of us.

My favorite birds to watch were the hooded mergansers. At first there was just one pair interacting…then another male came along and then another female. They were almost beyond the range of my camera without the monopod. The first pair was acting a lot like is was time to breed but New Mexico is far from their breeding grounds.

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The tour was an enjoyable 3 hours around the refuge wildlife loop.

Festival of the Cranes – part 7

The third fly out of our visit to Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge was back at the ponds along the road rather than the flight deck.  The thermometer said it was not as cold as our first morning…but it was still very cold. The pink morning light on the ponds gave the crane groups other world looks.

Ribbons of snow geese flew in.

A northern shoveller was feeding among the legs of the cranes. I managed to catch a picture when it swam into an open patch of water.

There was an intermingling of the snow geese and cranes. I noticed when I looked at this picture more closely that there are white snow geese and the darker morph of the snow geese (all with a dark grin patch – always reminds me of a streak of dark ‘lipstick’) plus some Ross’s geese that are smaller and without the dark grin patch.

But my photographic objective for the morning was to photograph cranes in flight. I picked two series for this blog post. I like to look at the wings….how the cranes change the configurations of their wings. It is obvious that is takes a lot more effort for them to land and take off (previous blog posts) than it does to stay aloft. 

When it’s two or three birds, it’s likely to be a family group. The group of five could a family group too since the birds have clutch sizes of 1-3 eggs. This could be a very successful breeding pair!

Festival of the Cranes – part 6

After the Point and Shoot Photography field session, I headed to the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge's Desert Arboretum. The entrance was hidden by the large tents put up for the festival expo and a classroom, but I managed to find it. There was already a larger group than I expected for the tour. The garden has been developed over many years by botanists and horticulturalists from seeds. I didn’t take many pictures during the tour since there were so many people --- waiting until the area was quiet again afterward. Most of the plants were cacti and agave; I took two pictures that were other types….the legume type plant for the color of the flowers and the other for the fibrous tendrils.

Now to the cactus. There were several kinds of prickly pear – many that still had fruits. The horticulturist talked about the various kinds of spines and that some were so fast growing that they had to be pruned. I noticed one that had been pruned and that spines had grown on the cut surface – probably to keep animals from borrowing into the soft flesh of the rest of the plant.

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The barrel cacti are colorful – fruits and spines. One specimen had yellow spines and fruits. Barrel cactus have been collected by so many people as whole plants rather than just the seeds which has caused some to become almost extinct in the wild…but prevalent in gardens. They evidently grow easy enough from seeds…with patience.

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There were several kinds of cholla. My favorite had red fruits.

The agaves have prickles on their edges and a sharp point on the end. There was a century plant that had bloomed two years ago but didn’t produce any seed since there was not another century plant nearby to cross pollinate it. The parent plant died after it bloomed but there is a ‘pup’ coming up under the dried parts of the parent plant…a little clone that will maybe grow up to bloom.

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The garden also is popular with birds because of the feeders and the plants. There are white-crowned sparrows,

Finches,

And red-winged blackbirds.

The birds were not around during the tour….but came back as soon as the crowd of people were gone.

As I left the arboretum, I saw the sculpture of the crane nearby. Once the expo tent is gone – it will be easier to spot.

Festival of the Cranes – part 5

On the third day in New Mexico, I had signed up for a morning of Point and Shoot Photography at Bosque del Apache. It was a 6 AM start so the sun was just beginning to come up.

The snow geese were spooked before sunrise and took off. I took a video but otherwise just enjoyed the drama of a lot of birds taking flight at the same time.

It was a time of color and silhouettes.

The light got warmer as the sunrise progressed. There were cranes overhead and I like the silhouettes against the brightening sky.  I was experimenting with the ‘sports’ setting on my camera – good for bodies in motion…including birds.

A little later but still early enough to have great morning light, we saw a small group of cranes and I took multiple series as parts of the group took flight.  It’s interesting to see how they move their wings to life themselves from the water; the powerful first strokes are different than the way the wings move once they are aloft. I’ve included 5 sequences with this post. This experience was probably the highpoint of the morning for photography.

Continuing around the wild life loop we spotted a killdeer near the edge of a pond…enjoying a bath and the looking around the debris for breakfast.

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The highpoint for birding was the snipe that I finally managed to see. They blend in with their surroundings!

Festival of the Cranes – part 3

We made our way to the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge Visitor Center after the fly out. It was still a very cold day. We looked around in the visitor center and bought sweatshirts – giving ourselves another layer for later in the week – and then watched the red wing blackbirds near the feeder in the Desert Arboretum nearby.

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There were still a few cottonwood leaves that had not turned brown.

The saltbush was thick with seeds.

We decided to take a turn around the wildlife loop. We saw quite a few Northern Shovellers

And coots.

My favorite water birds of the day were the pintails.

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There were crystals still prevalent on vegetation; it was colder than it looked.

The day was sunny – the sky clear blue – typical New Mexico in winter.

Startled snow geese filled the air periodically. I took some sequences later in the week…so more to come about them in subsequent posts.

Festival of the Cranes – part 2

Our first morning at Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge was before the festival officially started. We got up early to travel from our hotel to the ponds along the road just before the visitor center before dawn --- to see the fly out of sandhill cranes that roost there overnight. It was the coldest morning of the week! We bundled up with lots of layers (included snow pants), foot warmers in our boots, and handwarmers inside our gloves. I had a scarf with a hood and then the hood from my fleece too. We managed but I noticed frost forming on the head of my tripod where I breathed while I was taking pictures! I took pictures of a tree on one end of the pond that I remembered from 2016. The tree glowed with morning early light.

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Some of the birds were standing on mud….others on ice. I noticed one juvenile (the bird does not have its red patch yet) on ice that quickly stood on one leg. I lost track of the bird in the moving mass of birds, but I wondered if it changed legs after a time…to let the other one get warm.

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I took a series of pictures of birds landing and picked the two best sequences. It is interesting how they use their wings to soften their landing. The few birds that landed must have taken off a short time before from another roosting site. This is the first sequence.

And the second.

Some of them seem more alert than others. I like groupings where it is easy to see the iron dust they have on their feathers from their nest sites in the far north. In this picture there are the birds alert, sleeping, and preening….all close together.

The fly out is all about the cranes taking off. Again – I picked two sequences. They don’t go all at once…but in small groups. The power of the first few wing flaps – to get them off the ground – could be heard across the small distance through the cold air.

And then they are in sky heading to the fields where they feed during the day.

Cranes are paired for life, so it is not unusual to see pairs.

Once the sun was up it was easier to see that the shallow pond was more ice covered than water and how some of the cranes looked so much shorter…but with the large body of sandhill cranes. The morning color of the ice…not the golden from sunrise…is a metallic blue.

I started to look more closely at how the cranes were managing to walk on the ice. They did a little sliding but seemed to prefer taking off from the ice rather than the water.

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Just before we left, I took some pictures of the frosted vegetation.

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A cold morning…but a good start to our week in New Mexico.

Festival of the Cranes – part 1

We enjoyed our second Festival of the Cranes at Bosque Del Apache National Wildlife Refuge near San Antonio NM last week. Registration opened in early September and we decided quickly on the sessions we wanted…were early enough to get into them all. My criteria for sessions was: 1) something that we couldn’t easily do on our own or 2) a topic new to us or 3) something we enjoyed so much last time that we wanted to do it again!

A few weeks before our departure, I started a packing list color coded by packing location and then marked off as it was packed.

We knew the early mornings to see the fly out of the snow geese and cranes would be very cold…so lots of layers and hand/foot warmers. There were several days that we needed to carry lunch so we took an insulated bag. There was camera gear too; the tripods were in the checked bags – cameras in the carry on.  I took three pieces of luggage: a suitcase that would be checked, a rolling backpack, and a duffel. My husband took four (two that were checked).

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We didn’t forget anything…still have some ideas to do better packing next time.

I’ll be posting about the festival over the next few weeks. I took over 5,000 pictures in all because I set my camera on continuous shooting to capture motion (and I took some video too).

Blog posts about our 2016 experience of Festival of the Cranes:

• Coyote Gets a Duck

• First Day at Bosque del Apache

• Second Morning at Bosque del Apache

• The Very Large Array (VLA)

• Third Day at Bosque Del Apache

• The VLA at Night

• Elephant Butte Lake State Park

• Desert Arboretum at Bosque del Apache

• New Mexico Finale

• Home Again