INCOMING!!! Look Out 😉 As the one brown pelican checks its backside to get his tail feathers out of the way for the two diving behind him. Whew, close call.
Happy New Years Eve,
We went for a walk along the beach on a windy day and there were dozens of brown pelicans diving all in one area, but when I looked closer I noticed they appeared to be following some dolphins. As the dolphins moved around the pelicans were not to far behind. A short video below will show this amazing sight we saw.
I mentioned before about how the brown pelicans turn ever so slightly to the left to protect their esophagus. You will see this in the video below.
The Royal Terns Have Left the Court, well this is the closest I have been to these birds this week. I have driven by this marina many times since I took these photos and have not seen any birds there since. But I am always on the look out for the next exciting bird sighting. There are some new birds still to come as we venture along the gulf coast.
Merry Christmas Eve from our home to yours. A variety of colors from all our feathered friends. To brighten this day with cheer and love. Have a wonderful Christmas.
The King of the Royalty Court standing above all the others is of course the Brown Pelican. Mostly because of their size, they take what ever post they want and make the other birds leave. But they are such a beautiful bird as well I think. Dressed in all their brown plumage.
They are a facinating bird, especially when they are fishing. But I have noticed one thing here on the gulf coast, when the dolphins are around the pelicans follow them. Looking for the fish the dolphins round up I suspect.
There is More, I took plenty of photos of this beautiful bird in case I never see one again. There is one in the line that is different from the rest. Can you see it? 3rd bird down, he wants to be a Royal Gull I think. Standing with all the other Royals.
Its the Tern’s Turn This Week, The Royal Tern to be exact. We stopped at a marina because we saw a lot of birds flying around down at the end of a dock. So I got my camera out thinking they were all going to be Gulls and Brown Pelicans, but to my surprise there is a new bird at the end that I have never seen before.
The gorgeous birds with the orange bills of course, what a surprise. I love seeing new birds to add to my list. There are a lot of different kinds of Terns like most species, I looked at them all to determine which one this is and I believe it to be the Royals. They do sport a bit of a crown of feathers on their heads.
They seem so arrow dynamic on windy days as they lean into the wind perched on post.
Portrait of the Snowy Egret, we went out for a bike ride on this particular morning. The sun was still low in the sky and as we crossed a small bridge we came to a sudden stop. As we noticed this beautiful Egret perched on a branch just above the creek.
I slowly got my camera out, the sun was behind us creating a beautiful spot light, it turned to look towards me and I took the photo as you see. Sometimes when I am least expecting it, an average morning bike ride turns into a site that can take my breathaway.
A Southern Christmas at Bellingrath Gardens, a beautiful place to visit anytime of year. It is a historic home in Alabama where they have the most beautiful flower gardens all year long. In December they put up beautiful Christmas lights throughout their gardens in many different flower shapes and trees. Video below.
Merry Christmas and may we all have a wonderful season of love and giving. Have a Wonderful Weekend.
The Great Blue Heron to Music, We were walking back along this boardwalk and this Great Blue was perched on the railing. So I had to just stop and watch it for a bit as the wind blows his gorgeous feathers to the beat of the music in the video below.
What is Snowy and Great, that would be two different species of Egret Birds. The Snowy Egret has a black bill and a touch of yellow around the eyes. Much smaller than the great egret as well.
The Great Egret, as shown below, has always impressed me with their large wing spans. I love to try and photograph these beautiful birds when the are flying over water, to capture the tips of their wings just grazing the water is a fun challenge to do. One has to sit patiently for quite awhile to do this sometimes.
The Snowy Egret below enjoying the fresh catch of the day.
Birds Flying In Sync, I love watching birds in flight, especially in a group or a pair. Amazing how the timeing of their wing beats can be so in sync for just a moment in time as you watch them. To see them fly in formation is breathtaking to me as well.
There are two well-supported and complementary explanations for why birds fly in formation. One is to conserve energy by taking advantage of the upwash vortex fields created by the wings of the birds in front. The other is to facilitate orientation and communication among the birds.
Christmas in the Park; Bringing some holiday cheer. Christmas is a time of year where I find time to reflect on years past and present. It reminds me to think; “What’s Your Purpose in Life”,
An age-old question that each of us tries to answer throughout our lives. In the cycle of life that whirls around us like a wheel from the time the Sun rises to the time the Sunsets. We only have two absolutes to work with to answer that question;
Birth and Death an absolute that cannot be changed.
Male and Female an absolute that cannot be changed
These are two absolutes that exist within our spirits that made us who we are. If you try to alter the absolutes. All one is doing, is trying to create life, by changing the Laws of absolutes. We all create an alternative reality that shines brightly in our eyes, like the moon at night, to displace the darkness that engulfs us all.
To give our lives meaning. We run to and fro from one event to the next event in our lives picking up colorful jewels to hide our hurts. That overtime lose their luster. Then we look for other jewels to mask our hurts from prior events. So, others cannot see. We create a pseudo reality from the colorful jewels we clothe ourselves with.
This happens to so many people this time of year. Getting lost in the things of this world. Trying to become something they are not, trying to become what others say they should be like. I know, it happened to me years ago.
So, to answer the question, “What is my Purpose in Life?”.
I walked back one year to the Garden of Trees and sat in silence so that I may hear.
I am the One that created you, I gave you my life, my breath within you. I gave you words within you to raise yourselffrom the dead to become like one of us.
I do not deny the One who created me. Cut out the middle man, the serpent that blocks your eyes to the One that created you. That will only happen when your desire to live overrides what man told you on how to live.
Through the Tunnel & Over the Bridge to New Adventures We Go 😉
Someday is Here
You know how some of us say; ” Someday I am going to go on that big trip”, or Someday I will do __________.
Well, the word someday usually means never. I heard that in a movie that the actor Tom Cruise is in. He said that line.
Someday is here and our journey continues. I look forward to sharing photos of God’s Country along the way. I wish you all a wonderful weekend. Try to never put off what you can do today until someday. Life is a gift,
Life is a gift and death is a homecoming to me. Our body’s are on loan to us just for a short time to enjoy the wonderful things He gives us. I did not grow up in a Christian family at all. A neighbor told me a little bit about it when I was 10 years old and I have been searching for the truth ever since.
He never meant for it to be a mystery; it is the gift of life. Finding my purpose has been the journey, the end will just be the beginning.
Rare Find of the Reddish Egret, We happened across a new bird to add to my list last week, as we walked along the shoreline looking for a different bird at the time. I had no idea what this bird was, but believed it to be in the Heron family.
When I got back home I looked it up right away to find that it is a non breeding Reddish Egret. The species was adversely affected by plume hunting in the United States and extirpated from Florida in early 1900’s (Powell et al. 1989). It was recorded again in Florida in 1937 (Davis 1937, Desmond 1939) and since then has recolonized much of its former range
Dark morph adults are rich grayish blue bodies with vivid pinkish-cinnamon head and neck.
This bird stood patiently as we walked by, it did not seem to mind us at all. We pulled up our chairs that we were carrying and sat for a spell. I did capture some video as well and will show that at a later time.
In the stately and dignified world of herons, Reddish Egrets are the swashbuckling cousins. These big, cinnamon and steely gray birds put on a show as they forage in shallow saltwater.
Twist and Turns is the design of this tree, plus it is a great spot for the birds to perch on high above the forest floor. The trees in the south have so many different designs to them. Amazing how the branches seem to go in all different directions.
She was framed by His words to represent His Creation
Riding the Waves, I went for a walk this morning along the beach and I came across Darren the Heron looking like he is riding the waves on a branch bobbing up and down. He is trying to get a better view of the beach, looking for a fisher I suspect.
But there wasn’t any fisher’s on this particular morning, not a person in sight.
The Tri Colored Heron, this is a new bird for me to photograph. I posted one photo of it awhile ago, but I did not know what it was until a fellow blogger saw the photo and said it is named a Tri Colored Heron. Well, I was hoping to see this bird again and I did. I thought at first it was just a young heron because it is smaller but it is so much more colorful than the Blue Heron I normally see.
The fellow blogger is; Wildlife Intrigued, you can visit his blog by clicking his channel name. He has wonderful photos of birds as well and he is doing a count on how many he can see in a year. If you are interested there is a movie about this very subject; The Big Year, it is a true story about people who love to photograph birds and doing a big year, meaning seeing how many birds they can see in one year. A movie trailer below.
The big year record of 840 species was set by John Weigel of Australia in 2019
The world big year record of 6,852 species was set in 2016 by Arjan Dwarshuis of the Netherlands.
I started counting the birds I have seen and photographed this week, I made a spread sheet and started looking them up. So far I have come up with 83 species of birds and still counting that I have photographed.
A Wonderful Day to Give Thanks, flowers tend to dress up any thing we put them on. Whether it is our tables for special holidays like today, or like this old brick walkway, that has beautiful iron railings and worn bricks leading into a rose garden in this particular park. Video Below showing the flowers as we walk through this park.
They added cascading mum plants to this entry way, which changes the look to a more colorful vibrant entrance on it now. What I can not share with you here is the wonderful aroma coming from these flowers. I never realized mum plants smelled this good, but when you get enough of them together it is amazing.
Happy thanksgiving for many folks today, I hope everyone can enjoy a peacful day with family and friends or just spend some time out in nature. That is where I like to be the most.
Thank you to all of you who happen to come across my blog post here, I appreciate the time you take to view these photos and leave comments. I enjoy reading your words and am thankful for all the kind thoughts that you share every day. I enjoy sharing what I see through the lens of my camera with you and hope it brightens your day.
October November Flowers to Remember, Mums the word this November. I posted this first picture a couple of weeks ago and we went back to the same park yesterday and they had changed the flowers on the bridge to cascading mums. A beautiful sight to remember with colorful autumn mums.
All these colors have a way of brightning up ones day here in November.
Ship and a Boat, what is the difference? Well, I have always been facinated with ships, I don’t get to see them to often unless I am near the ocean of course. I have always thought about how they made the first boat and as time went by they now make ships like this one below.
We were driving by a ship yard and saw this huge ship being built for the Navy. I don’t know what it is, but there were actually 3 of them being built so I had to snap a photo of this one.
Of course as you walk by any marina down south, the boats are quite pretty. Or I guess you would call these yachts. These by the way are all for sale sitting here and they did not have prices posted on them. I can probably guess they are not cheap.
Then a huge container ship was headed our way so we sat on the edge of the dock and watched in amazement, just to see the sheer size of this thing up close is something to me. I have seen them way out in the waters before. But never this close.
Don’t Forget to Look Up, well I went for a walk to my favorite little lake here and they have a dock over the water and some benches to sit on. I walked up to the benches and sat down one early morning. I was enjoying the view in front of me and then I looked up and to my surprise, right above me stood this beautiful Egret bird, as quiet as it could be.
I slowly raised my camera up to photograph this bird high above me. Then it flew off, what a fun surprise this was. Sometimes I focus to much on what is right in front of me and I miss the beauty that surrounds me from above looking down at me.
