It's a Duck

Yes, I'm quasi-quoting Monty Python there. "So, if she weighs the same as a duck...?"

This particular duck was found today at Sarah Duke Garden, floating away and happy as could be. His partner was on the bank and acting kinda bossy and contrary. I don't know what accounts for the temperament difference but speculating on that difference could get me into trouble within my own species.

Sunrise

The sun is rising above the trees as I stop paddling for a minute to admire the scenery.

Heron before Dawn

I went out on the lake at 6am, about 25 minutes before dawn, and saw this bird at a point between two coves. I only got a few pictures of the heron before it flew off and these are the only two that weren't too blurred by the motion of my kayak and the dim light available.

The picture above was taken first, as I was approaching the point, and was taken at maximum zoom. The picture below I took about 2 minutes later while looking sideways at the heron. It was this motion, turning around in the kayak, that caused the bird to take off. Odd that he'd be afraid of people.

Laying up along shore

I was taking a picture of a heron while close to shore and got pushed onto the small rocks alongside the shoreline. It was hard to take a steady shot from this vantage point! Oh, the heron flew away, dammit.

Heron

Here's the fellow I was referring to in that last post. He was quite a ways away. I was using my 12X zoom and it's a little fuzzy due to the waves bouncing me around and it being an overcast day. I opened up my aperture as much as I could...

Want some tires?

I was kayaking this morning and took a picture of some tires. They're being used as a wave barrier at a sailboat marina. I used them as cover to take some pictures of a heron. They're rather shy and prone to fly off once they see you. The tires, on the other hand, are quite reliable and don't go anywhere. Not as pretty tho.

An Accident Waiting to Happen

This is the kind of picture that can make you nervous if you like zipping about in a power boat. I took this picture in January, on a bitterly cold day, in upstate SC. I was hiking and the log was quite a ways out--I used my 12X zoom to get the shot--so there wasn't anything I could do to the log. I just hope that it washed up on shore before some speedboat hit it.

Most lakes in the Carolinas were created in the 1940s by flooding valleys. As a result, there's lots of dead trees waiting down there. Scary thought.

Purple

I love purple flowers. These were at Sarah Duke Garden at Duke University. I took the picture 2 weeks ago and really need to go back there soon. There's a lot more flowers blooming now since we've had warm weather and some decent rain the past few days.

Contemplative Turtle

Last week I came across this fellow. It appears that he's just being mellow, calmly contemplating nature. I can't blame him one little bit. The picture below is the area immediately upstream of his perch. Not a bad place to live.

Ouch

I found this guy on a piece of cardboard right near my deck after work on Friday. He wasn't moving and at first I thought he was dead. He's got quite a wound on his back, between his front legs. A bird, maybe? In any case, after I took this picture he slowly moved under the paper. His back legs were slow but moving so apparently there wasn't any spine damage.

Gotta pee?

The body language on this little fella reminds me of a kid that has to pee. The crossed "hands" and legs just convey that message of urgency. So cute!

Feast

I hardly ever get any pictures of birds at this feeder.
How can they resist the luscious feast here?

blue jay

Blue Jays. Cyanocitta cristata if you want the Latin. Commonly referred to as "those damn Jays".

They frequent this area and I certainly do hear them often enough but for some odd reason I rarely see them in my yard. As you can see above, the markings on the back are quite striking and they have a distinctive beak as can be seen below, but despite their beauty, Jays are damn hard to like. They just make too much damn noise.

Spring

Even though it's only mid-March, here in eastern NC there's Spring in the air and the grackles are thinking of sex. Naughty birds!

A Bridge at Duke

Spring is coming

Grackles

Grackles are interesting birds. I love their mannerisms. I don't get many pictures of them 'cause for the most part they prefer to forage for insects on my yard rather than eat seeds out of my feeders--and they're somewhat timid around people. As you can see, this particular Grackle decided to take the easy route. At least on this day.

Early morning fog

While waiting for some Brunswick Stew to heat up in the microwave I went outside to take some pictures of the predawn fog. This was around 6:30am so there wasn't much light.

That can easily be seen by how blurred the above picture is. I first tried to just handhold the camera. Oops.


Here's the second try. This time I steadied the camera on the railing of the deck. I didn't want to bother getting my tripod out for a shot like this.

As you can see, there's a huge improvement. However I thought I'd just try and see what it would look like using the flash.


Hmmm. Those things you hear about water reflecting light are true. Even though the fog didn't seem all that dense, it sure did *uck up this shot. There's so much reflected light you can barely see the trees in my yard.

Icicles and bushes

The view yesterday from the lower half of my dining room windows. I really need to trim those trees back a little! Cute icicles though.

A Little More Snow

We got a little more snow last night. We'd had so much warm weather of late that I thought there was little chance of getting snow again this year. Wrong!

It never got above 40f today but the sun came out so strong that almost all the snow is now gone. It was pretty while it lasted.

A bright star in the trees

Just the sun poking through the trees. I took this picture near the suspension bridge at Eno River Park this past Sunday.

Bridge to the other side

I went on a hike today at Eno River Park with a ground of about 15 people. It's a group that Julie's been a member of for a while but it was the first time I went hiking with them. I'm not much of a "joiner", y'know?

This is part of the group wandering across a suspension bridge. The bridge bounced a lot and was great fun. It was like drinking heavily and not being sure if you could stay on your feet. The hike was a bit less than 5 miles and it was a great day for it. High 50s and a subdued sunshine made for a pleasant time. You should have been there with us! Rolling hills and well groomed trails, river views and mossy logs--but no snakes this time. Sorry.

Cold Cardinal

I took this picture a week ago and put it up on my main blog. I looked it over today and decided I liked it enough to post it here as well. You really need to click on it to see it larger to appreciate how miserable the poor cardinal is. Birds in the south, assuming they're not migratory, just don't appreciate snow very much. I completely understand their point of view!

This bird is bad!

Lee gave my birds some Christmas presents under the slender pretence of giving them to me. Ha! We all know she likes birds better than people.

But the gift backfired.

According to Lee, my Wal-mart birdfood is nasty and this high grade stuff she gave me would attract "better birds"--no sense of egalitarianism there, huh? Instead all I have is a very territorial mockingbird that grazes in the new feeder and won't let all my other birds eat at the old feeders. Bad bird!

Snow and Cardinals

She looks so concerned and vigilant whereas hubby, there below, just looks like a greedy pig.

To be fair, maybe they just have different ways of dealing with the snow and cold. I must admit--and maybe it's the male in me--that I also would rather go for the muffin than the bird seed.

Light Snow

At the risk of offending people with a good sense of humor, I'm titling this picture "Light Snow".

This past Saturday we received a couple of inches of snow in the Piedmont area of NC. Today most of it's gone due to two days blessed with lots of sunshine albeit unseasonably cold temperatures. It's 26f now at 7:40pm. Brrrr. But last night it dropped to 10f which for this area is very, very cold.

snow dunking

We had some snow here in NC this weekend and it had horrible affects on some of the locals. Here you can see a Dark-eyed Junco bobbing for seeds in a snow covered dish. 12 miles away in Chapel Hill the Tarheels, despite having a 18-0 record, lost to the unranked Maryland team. It had to be that damn snow.

Pudgy Cardinal

Apparently I'm a food enabler. Shame on me!

Bird in Tree at Dawn

Waterfall

My Dad and I hiked into this waterfall a few days after Christmas last month. It was quite beautiful--and surprisingly full of water considering the drought here in the Southeast. Of course there had been a fair amount of rain that week in upstate SC. It always seems to rain there when I visit, drought or not.