Showcasing the beauty of Mother Nature
Last week I decided that my Sunday posts for the rest of the month would focus on the topic Warm. It seemed fitting, given how cold it has been and how much I wish it would warm up.
Today, I decided to share images that make my heart feel warm and happy. It should be no surprise to any frequent visitor that this means elephants. Lots and lots of elephants!
I hope you enjoy my selections, and wishing you a wonderful week ahead.
This waterhole was in Nxai Pans National Park in Botswana. We stopped there after a trip out to the Baines Baobabs, and watched as a lone bull elephant approached the water. We all thought he was an enormous elephant. A few minutes later, another bull appeared, even larger, and the first elephant made way for the newcomer to choose the spot he wanted at the water. Then the third came along, and both the bulls at the water had to give way to the last that arrived to drink. I love watching these dynamics play out in nature. There was no struggle, no tension, just a simple understanding amongst the group of who got to be in charge.
I’ve skipped the January Month in Review post, because my posts were so infrequent and inconsistent, there doesn’t seem much point in trying to recap so little. A friend posted a meme the other day that seems a bit fitting ” January was a tough year, but we got through it”. We’re on to a new month now, and while I haven’t yet picked a theme for the month, I am going to get back to that as I enjoy the focus for a weekly post. Based on the current weather and forecast to come though, it probably won’t involve being outside shooting. It was too cold this morning to even get the dog out for a decent walk. And I’m not even in the midst of the polar vortex!
It felt like a good time to go through some of my photos from southern California, and today I focused on the roadrunner. These quirky birds were all around the golf course I stayed at in October, though they proved to be a bit shy when I got the camera out. With some patience though, I managed to capture a few images. I feel like these images should be accompanied by comments about Acme products and Wile E Coyote, but I’m coming up with nothing, so let’s get to the photos instead. 🙂
Wishing everyone a fantastic week ahead.
I was going to post some of these images on Wednesday last week for a wordless Wednesday post, but I was having a few site issues, and just didn’t have the patience to wait while WordPress loaded slowly. So instead, I’ve gone through my images and found a few more hummingbird images and am sharing them all today.
While I was in Southern California, I enjoyed my morning coffee on the patio, and loved watching the hummingbirds fighting over the best spots at the feeders and various flowering bushes. I also noticed how chattery the Costa’s hummingbirds are. They spent a lot of time singing from the branches of the bushes in the garden. The link below is the All About Birds page for the Costa’s hummingbird, and you can hear what they sound like there.
All About Birds – Costa’s Hummingbird
Seeing these images makes me long for spring even more, when the Rufous hummingbirds return to Prince George for another (short) spring and summer season.
This is a topic I haven’t done in a while! I’ve been trying to keep my camera close, as there is such an abundance of birdlife in my yard at the moment. It can be a bit challenging though, with the days being so short, and we’ve had a lot of overcast days recently. But even when the light isn’t great, it’s still awesome to have camera in hand.
I must apologize for the lack of posts over the last couple of weeks. I hadn’t intended on taking any time off the blog in the run-up to Christmas, but time just got away from me.
Christmas Day saw a very unusual visitor to the bird feeder – a Blue Jay. To those on the east coast I’m sure that doesn’t sound very exciting; but they are considered rare in my area, and I’ve not seen one since I was a kid growing up in Ontario, so I was thrilled. The jay was very skittish though and while I have seen it a few times over the past couple of days, they are usually blink and you’ll miss it moments. All I have to show for it are some fuzzy shots through my office window, but at least I have proof that it was here.
We’ve had a fair bit of snow the last few days, and it’s been very busy at the feeders; chickadees and nuthatches, flickers, downy and hairy woodpeckers, gray jays and even a visit from the magpies that I generally only see a couple streets over from where I live. The ruffed grouse has also been around quite frequently. I’ve been battling a bug with a nasty cough so I haven’t been outside much with my camera, but I did manage to capture the magpie and the grouse. Now that I am starting to feel better I am hoping to get out and capture more of birds in the yard, and perhaps with any luck the blue jay will make another appearance.
