A Walk in the Park

It was a lovely morning for a long walk in the woods of Ridley Creek State Park.  I got out there at 10 am (yeah, I know…) and spent about three and a half hours wandering.  It is a good way to clear the head.

As you can tell by now, I am not the best photographer. I’ve been too lazy to learn all the settings for my camera, to poor to get Photoshop (and too busy to figure out how to use it), not to mention I have poor eyesight and shaky hands. No matter. I take pictures anyway. But today would’ve been a good day to be fast and steady with the camera, because lots of little creatures kindly made themselves available for a photo shoot.

Check out the eyes (click for enlargement):

A wary fox

A fox a bit more relaxed

I really like Baltimore Orioles and their cheery whistling.  Here are some pics:

Baltimore Orioles at play (I think…)

Baltimore Oriole in flight

Ovenbirds are easy to hear (“teacher teacher Teacher Teacher TEACHER!”), but not so easy to see. But today one very kindly made himself available.

Ovenbird

Being still relatively new to birding, I hadn’t seen a Kentucky Warbler before this morning. I took about 70 shots of this guy, but “Old Shaky Hands” only came away with a few slightly worthy ones. Too bad, because this kind of closeup does not seem to happen every day.

A (blurry) Kentucky Warbler on the ground

Kentucky Warbler singing

Kentucky Warbler perched

Kentucky Warbler

I thought this was a nice shot of a Veery:

Veery

And, just because I like ’em, an Eastern Towhee:

Eastern Towhee

 

 

Advertisement

Another Beautiful Morning Birding

This morning, Ridley Creek State Park was crisp, clean, and cool (okay, even cold).  A great morning for a hike and for communing with nature.  I got to see Red Tailed Hawks squabbling over luncheon of small mammal, a Pileated Woodpecker being choosy about which tree was worth a peck, and, among many other species, a fairly large number of Eastern Towhees.  Here are a couple pics:

Here’s the female Eastern Towhee. Note the brownish hood.

And here’s the male Eastern Towhee, with his black hood.

[click the pic to enlarge]