Snowy Egrets at Palo Alto Baylands

The other day I posted the photos of the black-crowned night herons nesting at the Palo Alto Baylands. While walking around between the ranger's station and the fenced-in migratory bird area I saw these strange looking geese. Canada geese they are not! And as far as I can tell I would say they are "hybrid" geese. If anyone in blogland can identify these birds for me I would be appreciative. Meanwhile, we'll just call them hybrid geese. Feel free to click on any of the photos to get a larger view.

This pair of snowy egrets were in the palm trees closest to the pathway, closest to the fencing. And as I said last year seeing these birds nesting in palm trees, I never would have believed it if I didn't see it with my own eyes. Imagine, snowy egrets nesting in palm trees. Only in California (and possibly Florida).
This water area was also behind the fenced-in area, not far from the palm trees. Notice the flora looks like chaparral - shrubs between the water source and the palm trees.

This picture shows the chaparral and the base of one of the palm trees in the background. I guess you can say these Canada Geese were "visiting" the snowy egret rookery area. It seems that neither species was upset about the other sharing their territory.

Las Vegas National Wildlife Refuge, New Mexico

After our Mountain Birding Tour it was time to leave Socorro, New Mexico and head north. We drove to Albuquerque planning to eat lunch at one of our favorite restaurants before heading farther north (and east) to Las Vegas, New Mexico. When we arrived at the location of one of our favorite restaurants we found that Pereas wasn't there. Instead, it had a new name, Seferinos - located on Central and Alvarado. While waiting to be seated we found that the restaurant is run by the same family - known for some of the best true New Mexican fare. My husband had one of his favorite dishes, Carne Adovado, and I had a beef taco plate. We also ordered a couple of sopapillas. After lunch we headed north to Las Vegas, NM, about 60 miles east of Santa Fe. Once we arrived in Las Vegas we felt we should locate a motel before heading over to the refuge. As we exited from I-25 we saw what looked like a brand new, just opened Holiday Inn Express. We found out that it had just recently opened - they had only been opened for two weeks. I can't imagine a motel/hotel having a grand opening in a small (out of the way) town in early November (unless they are anticipating a lot of holiday traffic). We managed to get a suite for the night for only $85. It sure was luxurious. It had a flat panel TV and a king-size bed, with a fridge, microwave and a bar sink. We then headed over to the Wildlife Refuge to see if we could see any cranes flying in for the night. By now it was getting close to sundown. We did see some cranes flying in as well as snow geese. Most ducks and Canada geese had already arrived earlier. Below is what I attempted to capture of a virga in the clouds. And the second photo is the sunset we saw while driving through the refuge. That is Lake McAlister in the sunset photo, which is the largest lake on the refuge.

We headed back out to the refuge around 10 a.m (Mon, Nov 19). Below is a flock of Canada geese we saw while driving around.
We also saw many ravens throughout the refuge, in the fields and perched in trees.
And then we saw sandhill cranes in several fields. Here are a few photos of what we saw.
Notice ravens perched in the trees in the distance.

Here we found a red-tailed hawk surveying his territory.

This is a view of the Sangre de Cristo range, part of the Rocky Mountains, in south central Colorado from the refuge.

Stay tuned for part 2 of Las Vegas National Wildlife Refuge. The next post I will provide more photos of other birds we saw.

A short hike and a few birds

Last Sunday around 2 p.m. I decided to walk to the percolation ponds located about a mile from where I live. These ponds are a small portion of a larger area known as the Los Gatos Creek Trail, a part of the Santa Clara County Park System. As I was walking over the overpass of Hwy 17/Hwy 85 I could look down into the first few ponds and I saw these double-crested cormorants sunning themselves.

Reaching the first three ponds I saw this snowy egret in the middle pond.

As I was watching the snowy egret I noticed a large bird flying around about twenty feet above me. It looked like it was wanting to "land." Well, I guess it was picky where it wanted to land. As you can see from this picture the great blue heron chose to land here next to a snowy egret. What a great opportunity for a photo shoot, comparing the sizes of these beautiful birds. I couldn't imagine these two birds "socializing" with each other. Mmmm. But wait, there's something else in this photo that has me wondering. Take note that the snowy egret's bill is a pale color. Why is that? Is this a juvie? Is that why the bill is a pale color? But all the guides I checked on say the immatures have black bills. I'm really confused on this one.

As I looked across the way on the other side of the trail I saw this great egret. Looks like it just sat there waiting for its picture to be taken.

A little while later the great blue heron decided to move, and flew over to a brushier area, but still close to the pond. Another perfect photo moment. This bird did much the same as the great egret - it seemed to be posing. And it stood there for the longest time, so I was able to get shots of it from various spots. But this was the best shot of all. Isn't this an elegant looking bird, just as elegant looking as the great egret?

In another pond was this Canada goose - all by itself. I guess this bird wanted it that way. But again, I was given another good photo moment. The only problem I had was that this bird was dipping into the shallow water for whatever it is that they eat. So I would have to try and catch this bird in an upright position each time it came up for a breather, which was less than 2 seconds each time. Doesn't that water look serene? And to think there is this noisy freeway about 50 yards to the east of this "serenity."

Off the side of the pond where the Canada goose was I spotted this (I think) ring-billed gull - all by itself. He/she caught a small flat fish and was "playing" with its food. It was fun to just stand there and watch this bird. It would hold the fish in its bill, then drop it, then peck at it (even though it was totally dead), then pick it up and hold it its bill, drop it, and peck at it again, etc. You could say I was being totally entertained by all these "solitary" birds.

I then decided to walk the trail a little further, heading north. And on the trail I came across quite a few scrub oaks. And here is a shot of their fruit. I guess you can say it's fall around here - we have subtle ways of seeing the seasonal changes around here.

As you walk further down the trail it's like you are straddling between the ponds and you are on a higher road where the vegetation is drier, and the water is farther down the hill on each side. There are some power lines crossing over the trail and there are always some birds perched on these wires. Across the way were these double-crested cormorants. I wouldn't believe it if I hadn't seen it for myself. There were at least a dozen cormorants spread out, perched on the wires. Closer to me, just above me, were about the same number of rock pigeons. As I'm standing there taking pix of the cormorants I sensed something else flying around out of the corner of my eye. I stopped to see if I could ID the bird. Well, it finally perched itself in the top of a tree. The tree was about twenty feet ahead of me. I caught a beautiful sight of (I think) a sharp shinned hawk in my binoculars, but when I went for my camera, by the time I focused in on the bird.... Yes, we've all had these stories -- kind of like a fisherman's story of the big one that got away. ;-) Meanwhile, I looked up at the pigeons and told them that one of them will probably be his/her dinner for the evening.

I guess another good sign of fall around here are all the places we find lots of spider webs. I saw this on the trail not far from the power lines. This whole area of vegetation was full of webs. How about that blue sky for a background?

And here is another form of fruit from another plant growing in abundance on the trail. I think it is so attractive, even though it did have quite a bit of webby material around it. Click on it to enlarge to see the webby material.

In addition to the birds mentioned above, I also saw pied-billed grebes, mallards, American coots, killdeer, one black phoebe, several song sparrows, and a few red-wing blackbirds. Overall, I saw a total of 14 species. Not bad for a two-hour walk.

More photos of Historic Jamestowne

This year marks the 400th anniversary of the settlement of Jamestown, aka, Historic Jamestowne. While visiting this island, Red and I attempted to absorb the richness of our country's history and realizing that this was the place where it all started. We walked the pathway that pointed out the ruins of a number of buildings which once stood, and we tried to visualize what this colony of English settlers must have looked like in the early 17th century. Below are photos of what we saw while walking around. And if you click here you will be directed to Red's blog which also has photos of Historic Jamestowne.

This is a depiction of rowhouses that were built (I think in the latter part of the 17th century), when Jamestowne became a bustling outpost.

This photo shows the foundation of where the rowhouses once existed.



Along the pathway while walking around and viewing the ruins and foundations I found this "family" of Canada geese. I guess they were eating seeds found in the grass. I know it's not a really sharp photo, but this was the best shot I could get. It's not easy getting photos of birds, albeit large birds, in a very tall grassy area.


Due to the muggy weather, which Red and I are not used to, we decided to take a drive around the island and cool off in our air conditioned car. In doing so, we came upon an area called Black Point. Time to get out and see what this area had to offer. What we saw beyond all the trees was a small beach setting looking across the James River toward the mainland. There were several dead trees, some still standing while others were fallen over. While heading back to where we parked our car, a deer ran across our pathway. I guess she was wanting a drink of water. Of course, we did not have our camera ready, and she disappeared rather quickly. But we were able to get a picture of the bald eagle who kept eyeing us.