Boolie

Oh Ridgefield!

I got up at 5am this morning with yellow on my mind.

Like last week, I hoped to photograph yellow-headed blackbirds up at Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge. However, the yellowheads were staying more in the interior of the marsh this week. I can’t say that I blame them, last week the red-winged blackbirds were harassing them a bit but this week they would mob the yellowheads mercilessly every time they came to the edge.

Even so, my morning did turn out to be about yellow — not from blackbirds but yellowthroats and goldfinches. After spending six hours at the refuge last week, today I stayed for ten hours. I would have stayed longer but the weather was supposed to be sunny and I had only played to stay for a couple of hours and hadn’t brought enough food and water.

Remind me to ignore the weatherman next time.

I took far fewer pictures than last week but my quarry was more elusive. The yellowthroats were staying mostly out of sight, and when they did pop up to sing they were either chased by the redwings or by other competing yellowthroats. I was ready to call it a day and about to start the car to leave when a goldfinch popped into view. That convinced me to wait a while longer but again was ready to leave when this male yellowthroat finally appeared.

I wish the out-of-focus cattail wasn’t in front of the cattail that he is actually clinging to, but I still think it’s a cute picture. I got a few others I was happy with so stay tuned for those, plus a few goldfinch pictures.

The Only One Not Singing

On a day I spent watching birds sing, from yellow-headed and red-winged blackbirds to song sparrows and marsh wrens, this little barn swallow was the only one not singing. After swarming over the lake hunting insects with the rest of the barn and tree swallows, he landed on this cattail for just a moment, opened his mouth wide a couple of times, preened a few feathers, then took to the skies once more.

I Don’t Think He’s Right But …

Sometimes I think I take just a few too many pictures of my cats, but this glyph in the Rinconada Canyon at Petroglyph National Monument makes me think a kindred spirit once roamed these hills. Templeton thought it might be an image made of him, but I thought no since he was far too young. He said in human years yes but in cat years no. I don’t think that’s how it works, but on the other hand …

Blackbird

I got up early this weekend hoping to see blackbirds at Ridgefield and wasn’t disappointed, both redwings and yellowheads were active near the edge of South Quigley Lake. My yellowhead pictures aren’t as good as previous years but it was still nice to see them singing and chasing each other around. I didn’t catch this male redwing singing but I love the colors of the early morning light. Song and savannah sparrows were also out and about and singing their hearts out, those pictures are yet to come.

Visitations Part II

Some more quick thoughts on my web traffic since my last update:

I was mistaken earlier when I said that I had been visited by 49 states with West Virginia the lone holdout. It turns out West Virginia hadn’t visited, that part was true, but neither had Delaware or Rhode Island. West Virginia did visit this week, followed by Delaware, and then finally Rhode Island, so all 50 states have now stopped by. Drinks are on me!
I am unpopular with the druids. Exactly zero visits from the towns around Stonehenge. Zero! This may hurt my chances at becoming Archdruid.
I am also unpopular in Japan (Finland and China have since clocked in, so Japan is the lone holdout of countries I’ve visited). Perhaps the druids have taken over Japan. I need to look into this.
Each country has a two letter identifier at the end of their Internet address, except for the US, which is only fair since Al Gore did invent the Internet. Much like two letter identifiers for the states of the US, however, some of them are not for the countries I expected. For example, did you know that Switzerland is ch, so China is not ch but cn, and Canada is not cn but eh?
Canada has visited but at a much lower rate than I expected compared to the US. I had planned to run a targeted campaign by blogging about hockey sticks and Pocky sticks (attracting both Canadians and the druid-Japanese), but I no longer believe it will be enough to attract my friends to the north. What we need is an invasion. Fifty-Four Forty or Fight! Who’s with me? Hello? Anyone? Hello?

Go Ahead and Get Comfortable, Em

Another picture from New Year’s Day as Emma tries to get comfortable in her new home, here resting on the dresser in our bedroom.

Barking Up The Right Tree

While in Taos, my wife and I drove out to the Wild Rivers Recreation Area for a little hiking and sight seeing. My wife wanted to touch the Rio Grande so after waiting for some thunderstorms to pass through, we hiked the Little Arsenic Trail down into the Rio Grande Gorge. Following a long and seemingly endless series of switchbacks down into the canyon, we were tired but happy when we finally reached the riverbank. The trees by the water had a beautiful red color and I loved the patterns in their bark. The hike back up was even more punishing, but I was excited to find a tarantula sharing the trail with us, the first one I’ve seen in the wild.

Bed Time

Photographing Emma is harder than the other cats because it’s difficult to balance her dark fur with the surroundings. I found her sitting on the edge of our bed on New Year’s Day and bounced the flash off the ceiling.

The Black of Night

Another picture from New Year’s Day, Emma’s first full day of freedom to roam the house. This was also the time I started carrying a flashlight to bed with me.

When I used to go to bed, I’d leave the lights off to avoid waking my wife and head up the stairs in the dark. We’ve lived here enough years that I can do it easily by feel. Templeton would stay behind in my office to sleep while Scout would wait (oh so patiently) for me to come to bed so she could climb on top of me. When the new cats arrived, however, I found that I was not alone in my climb upstairs in the dark. Sometimes Emma would hang out on the stairs like here and sometimes she’d literally follow me underfoot. It was impossible to see a jet black cat in the pitch black stairwell and I ran into her more than once. So I started carrying a flashlight so I could see my little black shadow before I kicked her.

Now that she’s so comfortable here, she often stays where she’s sleeping like Templeton used to. I’ll rub her head before I head upstairs to see if she wants to join me, and she gives me that “Would you get up if you were in my shoes?” look that my little gray cat used to give me, and then she goes back to sleep. She’s in bed with us when we wake up in the morning, so apparently she just comes to bed in her own time.

The Stare

Sam on New Year’s Day. He was still getting treatment on his ears at this point so some of the hairs in his ears are wet. The drops were cold since the medicine had to be refrigerated, so little Sam was understandably less than happy about his treatment. Despite the intense stare in the picture, though, he was immediately all purrs and happiness when you finished rubbing the drops in and started cuddling with him. Although he had a handful of things he had to be treated for from the time he was at the Humane Society through his first couple of weeks with us, thankfully he’s been healthy ever since.