The boyfriend found this giant pod and insisted that we all smell it. I pretended to smell it but didn't actually breathe in. Sorry. This was a lake we saw. A little boy told us the birds out there were ducks but later on we learned that they were Coots. Are Coots ducks? For the pseudo- ornithologists among you this post is chock full of interesting things, so pay attention, or not.
Prarie like grass and this strangely red stuff.
A cute little bluebird sitting on a blade of whatsit. We also saw a red winged black bird but I was told they're so common they don't count for jack so I won't include the photograph of it.
This was the first time in three months that I've had any time in a flat not city like atmosphere. Though it wasn't like we were in real country side, every way you looked you could see the faint outlines of boxy industry. But if you looked down you'd see cute, though perhaps kind of stupid, field mice like this one. This guy took about ten pictures worth of time to decide maybe he didn't like all us big people staring at him.
Purty.
So. Not included visually here is much playing on play ground equipment and hitting stale tennis balls with sticks. But maybe later. Oh yes also we saw a bald eagle. Well, I saw the tail of a bald eagle. Then after about an hour of hard core swing set action we started walking back to our car. We came around a bend in the path and there was this middle aged guy with a hat and a tripod just standing there. We nodded as we approached and once we got a little closer he said:"Will you come with me for a minute. I have something I want to show you. It's not something you see everyday."
And then the four of us, all college graduates and reasonably intelligent young people, just shrugged our shoulders, asked no questions and began following him down a different path. I was in the back with the friend we were visiting and I mentioned to him how strange it was that we were following this guy we didn't know down a path we didn't need to go on to see God knows what and not one of us thought to say something like:
"Uh, who are you exactly? And are you about to kill us then take photographs?"
Of course this man actually did us a great favor. After about five minutes he stopped and put his tripod with camera like thing attached to it on the ground. He proceeded to fiddle with the lens for a second before saying:
"Look."
And what do you think he showed us?
Take a minute and guess.
I'm going to tell you now.
He showed us, with his uber cool binocular 45x magnification thingy ma jiggy, a nest. A nest a good quarter of a mile away and way way way way up in a tree. If you only had your naked nudie eye you'd see a clump of leaves and if you thought about it at all you'd chalk it up to a squirrel nest. But lordy lordy this was much cooler. We saw a nest and in it was one adult Great Horned Owl. Wow! Neato. The focus and zoom was so great you felt like you were looking into its eyes. But even more amazing than that were the two, yup two, baby Great Horned Owls all fluffy and yawning and cute as can be.
The end.
It was really cool.
I wish I can a camera with a super zoom so you could fully understand how neat it was.
Ooh. Also on the ride home we saw two pheasants. And they, too, are neat...and probably nice to eat.
3 comments:
There were four pheasants.
coots aren't ducks. they are similar in shape and habits, but are more closely related to the Moorhen and the Gallinule, which are less like ducks.
i think will had pheasant in romania and said it was pretty good.
oh, and great horned owls are awesome.
Before you were born, I was riding with Joan in Pa. and she spied a roadkill pheasant, which she swung back to pick up. We had much back and forthing about eating it, and much consultation with the Joy of Cooking, but in the end, I think one of her neighbors took it "to hang" and eat. " A three day hanging period is advised,during which the color of the breast will change somewhat and there will be a slight odor."
(J.of C.) You can understand our reluctance! mcmc
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