Best Director - Dana
Best Overall Performance - Dana
Welcome back sports fans. Where have I been you ask? Read on.....
I last posted on the evening of Valentine's Day. What occurred after that post, I'd soon forget. My health took a sudden downturn. We're talking a few hours. 3 days later I emerged from my bed to begin several days of recover from a mysterious illness. Without Dana's 24/7 support I would not have recovered so quickly. If anyone is concerned, thank you but all seems to be fine. We'll just accept the mystery and move on.
Today we had planned to return to cycling only to wake to 30 km winds. So, to kick start our return to physical activity we elected to run our favourite desert trail run in Usery Park. 8km in 62 minutes. A good sweat. At the end of the run we were both winded and happily complaining of muscle soreness. Finally we got in some good hard physical activity.
This past week has not been totally wasted, although at times that would be a good description of me. After my meds kicked in and my recover was evident we began several days of birding. For a novice birder like myself the weeks species identification has been remarkable. I would suggest that even for experienced birders this week would be memorable.
Before I detail the bird count, I should mention that we were defeated in our last league Bocce Ball game. The defeat came at the hands of 4 men who must spent most of their waking hours on the Bocce Ball courts. One of the men, Mario, was born in Italy where he learned the game and played regularly. I won't mince words here, I was pissed that we lost. The loss took us out of playoff contention. In retrospect, and I do believe in being a gracious in defeat, regardless of our skill the team that beat us was far more skilled than us and definitely deserved to win. If we meet them again next year I hope we crush them like bugs.
Now to the bird count. My own total bird species count since January 1st is 91. This past week it wasn't about numbers rather about adding a few new birds to my, and Dana's life lists. We spent Tuesday morning at the Gilbert Water Ranch. The birding there was terrific and we saw several beautiful birds that we had seen during visits last year. While we added bird species to our yearly total, the life birds were yet to come. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday found us walking the shores of the Salt River in search of some very beautiful birds. It was during these 4 days that we saw our first of the year Northern Cardinals, Vermillion Flycatcher and Red Napped Sapsucker. If these were the only species we observed it would have been a great week of birding, but wait, there is more.
New birds this week for both Dana and I are:
Spotted Sandpiper
White-throated Swift
Gray Flycatcher
Canvas-backed Duck
Gadwall Duck
House Wren
Western Bluebird
Green-tailed Towhee
All of these eight birds are, in their own way magnificent. I admit to being particularly partial to the Green-tailed Towhee. We, no Dana found a pair of these beautiful birds in thick under brush at Granite Reef park on the Salt River. They were very shy and hard to spot as they were happy to scratch for their food out of our sight. It took 20 minutes of standing still before we were able to clearly identify them. Time well spent indeed. The Western Bluebirds were another terrific find. The colouring on these birds is very dramatic. I have included photos of the Green-tailed Towhee and Western Bluebird. Both photos were down loaded from the internet and not actual photos that we took.
This week we also saw some of our favourite birds in interesting settings. I have included a couple of photos that took. One is of 2 Great Egrets in a dead tree with Red Mountain in the background. The second is of a Harris' Hawk family on a power pole. This picture is not terrific but it was neat seeing 3 Harris' Hawks together.
Well, the show is about over for the day. Tomorrow we will get up prepared to ride our bikes. The weather is improving this week and we are looking to 80F by Saturday. We hope to make the most of the warm days with riding, hiking, birding, etc. The Show must go on.....
Enjoy the pics. Ciao!
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| Western Bluebirds |
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| Green-tailed Towhee |
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