Better than Saturday morning Cartoons

The beaver swamp was filled with action this morning.  First thing that caught my attention were the Wood Ducks.  We've had a few days that have been above freezing recently, so there is some water again.

We saw the first pair of Wood Ducks on March 27th.  This is a photo from this morning, of a drake on the left and a hen on the right. 

This morning, I counted nine wood ducks all together!  First though, the group I was watching across from our house had 5 drakes and one hen!  Not a good ratio.  As you could imagine, there was some action between the drakes, as you can see in the next two short videos.  

There are Red-winged Blackbirds singing, and Canada geese honking in the background of this one:

 

In the next one, Red-winged Blackbirds are calling "Oka-lee" and there is a Song Sparrow singing, and one of the Wood Ducks chases another:

Now that you've heard some of the other birds of the swamp, here's one with the Wood Ducks calling:

The Wood Ducks all swam toward the other end of the swamp, and a short time later, back they came.  This time, there were 3 pairs of drakes and hens, and only one lone male.  Phew!  That's a better ratio!

My attention was so focused on the Wood Ducks, that until I saw it in one of my videos, I did not notice another little duck.  I went back out and watched for it again, and luckily, this Green-winged Teal was still there.

That's not a great photo, but it's the best one I got, and is good enough to identify it by its' white band on the side and rump patch, plus its' dark rufous head with the green eye band.  It doesn't show up as green in the photo, but in my new binoculars, it was quite clear and pretty! (Thanks, F)

Just as I didn't notice the teal right away while I was watching the flamboyant Wood Ducks, these other ducks were kind of hard to see:

There are two ducks in that photo.  The one on the right is pretty easy to see, but the one to the left has its' head under the water.  Here's a slightly better shot:

And, now you can see him!

How about those orange legs and greenish-yellow bill!  Looks like a pair of American Black Ducks, which would be a first-time sighting on our swamp.

Another thing I got rather excited about this morning was this:

 A Great-Blue Heron sat atop the 'nest tree' where we had a pair of herons raise a family during the summer of 2012.  If you didn't read about it before, here's a link to my blog post about that.  I didn't go too close, because I didn't want to scare it away.  It stayed there for maybe 10 minutes, meanwhile a goose strolled along below the heron tree.  I hope the herons don't mind noisy neighbors.  I would love to have another "heron summer".

If you look closely, you can see the heron nest in the tree right behind the goose, and the heron sitting on top.  In case you have trouble picking them out, here they are:

I'm sure you can see the silly goose!

Birds and Ice

Birds and ice was not the subject I was hoping to be writing about today.  ('Global Warming', where are you?  Oh, I forgot, it's 'Climate Change' now.)  

We did have some water in the swamp, but this morning, it's all ice again.  No birds in sight out there today:

Sorry if that is a depressing photo for March 26th.  I'm trying to have a 'thankful' attitude... but it's getting a bit hard.  

Spring -- where are you?  

Even the bluebirds have given up guarding the bird houses.  I still hear them singing sometimes though, so I guess I should, too.

There have been some more birds returning northward.

Or southward?

Or, not really sure where they should go?  These 3 photos were all taken of the same flock of Canada Geese, while I was standing in the same spot!

Our resident geese are back, too.

At least, they were.
Until this happened...

And this...

This spot of water got smaller and smaller yesterday afternoon.  This was the only goose I could see.  (There has been one goose who is 'single' and the other geese have made it an 'outcast' - honking at it and chasing it around).

This morning that goose is not anywhere in sight either, and the puddle is iced over.  

Sorry for the electric line in the photo... I didn't feel like going outside (brrr!) so this was taken from our window.

One heron was back and using a nearby spot on Monday.

I watched it for awhile (once again, from our window, thankful I was inside where it was warm!) and I'm happy to tell you it did catch something and eat it.

Then it flew off when it heard my hubby bringing the wood cart in our driveway (I'm sure he's getting tired of that chore!).

Okay, I'm thankful we have wood to keep our nice cozy house warm, and I'm thankful I don't have to stand in icy cold water to catch my food.  I'm thankful to be able to watch birds out my windows, even if the weather is not what I would wish for right now!  But sometimes, I think I'd be thankful for wings to be able to fly away, too.  I know which direction I'd head -- south!

After all that kind of depressing stuff, I'll leave you with a short video that makes me smile.  I videoed this a few days ago, when the geese were all worried over the 'single' goose I mentioned earlier.  Be sure to watch for the unfortunate goose near the end of the video, who falls thru the ice unexpectedly!  I'm also thankful that wasn't me!

Harriet, Hank, and Freddy?

Late yesterday afternoon I was in the kitchen, making dinner.  It had been raining and then the sun broke thru the clouds, so I went to the living room window to see if there was a rainbow.  Conditions weren’t just right for a rainbow, but I saw something else beautiful instead.

There was a Great-blue Heron and a pair of Mallards.

As I looked a little more, I saw two more herons.

Last year, for the first time in the 36 years we’ve lived here, a pair of Great-blue Herons nested in the beaver swamp across the road.

This was very exciting and we watched the nest closely.  Herons usually nest in colonies, and there is a large colony of them along the Susquehanna River, but that’s quite a few miles from us, and not easy to see even if you go there.  Now we had a nest we could watch everyday! 
 

When I asked a bird expert about our lone heron’s nest, he told me that occasionally a pair does this.  He said they might continue to nest by themselves in the future, or perhaps more will join them.

We had a wonderful spring and early summer watching the adults incubate the eggs...then, finally some fuzzy heads appeared! 

They got bigger and bigger quickly -- four babies when we could finally count them!

Here they are looking as big as the adult, who came to feed them and is sitting on top of the tree.

Unfortunately, one very hot, sunny day, the smallest one did not make it, but the other three continued to grow and then practice stretching and flapping their wings.  They also practiced the motion they would make once they would be feeding themselves, by making quick, stabbing motions in the nest.  

They would walk out on the dead tree limbs and flap their wings.  We wondered if a limb would break!  It never did.  Herons have hollow bones like all birds, so even though they look heavy, they actually only weigh 5 to 6 pounds.

Finally, they each flew from the nest, one by one... and then they were fun to watch as they learned to fend for themselves in the swamp.  They also returned to the nest from time to time.

 So, anyway, back to yesterday afternoon.  Here were 3 herons.  Could they be our “babies” from last year?  I hope they are! 

 No one is using the heron nest this year.  Although for a few days, we thought this silly goose was going to!

I like to think these herons are the siblings who were raised in the nest last year.  They do seem to have some sibling rivalry going on, as the two in the back weren't acting very happy to be so close to each other.

One decided to try fishing somewhere else and the other one flew away, too.

“Hey, where are you going?”

“Guess I’m stuck here with the Mallards.  They’re not much fun... they just keep sticking their heads underwater!”