The Dark Side of the Heron

The female blue heron hears the love screech of the male. She picks her heart's desire and settles on a branch nearby. The male immediately begins to court her. The moment she indicates interest and approaches him, though, he changes his mind, becomes unpleasant, shoos her away, or even attacks her. As soon as the discouraged female flies off, he screeches after her. If she gives him another chance and flies back, he may very well attack her again. Gradually, though, should the female's patience last that long, the fickle male's grumpiness subsides and he may actually be ready to mate. He is conflicted and ambivalent. Sex and aggression are mixed up in his mind, and the confusion is so profound that, if not for the patience of the female, this species might fail to reproduce itself. If ever there was an avian candidate for psychotherapy, the male blue heron is our nominee. ~Carl Sagan

These photos are from last summer. A heron was becoming increasingly troublesome and lazy about its proper fishing habits, turning instead to the furry rodent buffet which presented itself to him at the base of the bird feeders. Multiple feeding stations were kept full year-round to attract hoards of birds, which it did. But it also drew red squirrels, grey squirrels and chipmunks - and flying squirrels and raccoons at night. The heron in turn, continuously stalked these cute little daytime beasties, and all too often could be seen making off with one of them in its bill. It would seem that overstocking leads to over-stalking.

This is the darker side of the heron (quote-wise).

I think the very word stalking implies that you're not supposed to like it. Otherwise, it would be called 'fluffy harmless observation time'.

~ Molly Harper

This is more or less where the heron is supposed to be - checking out the lake for fishing prospect. This was right after one of the many times it was chased away from trying to capture Chip or Dale.

It is a negligence of the mind not to notice how at dusk, heron comes to the pond and stands there in his death robes.

~ Mary Oliver

Contemplating its next move.

I think anybody with an insecurity, which is everyone, appreciates the fact that it's much easier to be a predator than it is to be prey.

~ James Van Der Beek

It turned and left the dock in search of a place to fish, presumably.

Lazy and indifferent, shaking space easily from his wings, knowing his way, the heron passes over the church beneath the sky. White and distant, absorbed in itself, endlessly the sky covers and uncovers, moves and remains.

~ Virginia Woolf

It seemed to have a place in mind.

A stilted heron labored up into the air and pounded down the river. ~ John Steinbeck

Wings raised in a hopeful V for victory.

Freedom is only the distance between the hunter and his prey. ~ Zhenkai

Unsuccessful, or unwilling to put the work into it, it turned back to see if it could make its way back to the chipmunk diner.

The man flaps about with a bunch of feathers: the woman goes to work softly with a cloth.

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

I think it was just having a bad heron day. ;)

If you wanna find out what's behind these cold eyes You'll just have to claw your way through this disguise. ~ Pink Floyd

Yep, back on land in search of furry critters in a day-long feeding frenzy for all.


More photos will be on the wing soon

Beautifully Blue

Aside from a couple of days here and there, I've not spent much time blog visiting. It's been about ten days since I've spent any time up at our new place as I'm still focused on getting the old place ready for sale. We came close last week. The house hasn't been listed yet but my agent had someone in mind whom she thought might be interested. There was a conditional offer which was accepted but he backed out in the end. Back to the drawing board. 

Except for this preamble, this post was prepared a while back. I hope you enjoy.

Oh! `darkly, deeply, beautifully blue', / As someone somewhere sings about the sky.

~ Lord Byron

A lone blueberry, sitting atop our deck rail, waiting for someone to come along and claim it.





And this sweet chickadee obliged. But that berry is far too big to fit in its little mouth.






Clever wee thing.






Frank happened to notice our pal, the Great Blue heron resting on the neighbours' raft. He looked this-a-way.






And that-a-way.






And then flew off to share his magnificence with nearby kayakers.






A young Blue jay waits patiently for mama to return with a morsel of food.






Do you think mama will share her bounty?






I can't complete a blue post without showing you the lovely blue skies, late in the day, over Blueberry Island.

More photos coming up soon.

Like a Walk in the Park

It's been ages since we've taken a walk around the pond path together. There's some mulled apple cider by the door - the spiced rum is optional. Please grab a cup and join me.

My own front yard offers this sedum (Autumn Joy) bloom in its early, pink stages of opening.

It must have rained earlier. These droplets on a broad leaf sure do catch the eye.

More proof of the recent rain.

This is my favourite spot at my local park and I've photographed it often. The subtle changes of autumn have begun to take place. Look closely to the right of the tree roots and you'll see Mr. Blue fishing the shore.

A Queen Ann's Lace, closed up tight. Lots of tiny seeds adorn each little bloom.

Here's how it looked wide open, in full bloom. Notice the tiny red flower in the center? My bloggy pal Linda pointed that out to me in one of her earlier blog posts. I never noticed the red petals before and now I look for it every time. Thanks, Linda!

And last, but not least, one of my favourite late summer to early autumn flowers - the wild chicory. Such a pretty shade of blue.

I hope you enjoyed the walk. Let's do it again sometime soon.

This is a scheduled post. In all reality, I didn't just walk around the pond because Frank and I are up at the cottage for a few days for one last visit, this year. Still, feel free to help yourself to the cider. It's virtually a bottomless cup.

Wing Pairs

Below are a few pairs of images, each sporting a pair of wings. They were all taken up at the cottage earlier in September. I hope you enjoy them.

One morning, we glanced out the window to see a large figure sailing through the air, just above the surface of the lake. Mr. Blue landed on the dock. He squawked a few times and had a good look around.

Thankfully, he waited around while I made my way outside to snap a few photos. He obliged me with a few glances my way, while he walked along the dock and took off just before he made his way to the shoreline.

Another blue beauty, this blue jay found the bird seed on this fairly windy day. I liked the way his feathers were all ruffled by the wind.

Another blue jay at a different feeding post.

A lovely dragonfly with gold-tipped wings and a red body, which isn't visible in this image.

But it is in this one. This magical winged creature was resting on Frank's cozy shoulder. Having rested my own head in that same, general vicinity, I can't say that I blame him one bit.

For a few days, we were hearing and spotting a Kingfisher around the cottage. They're quite elusive though, and it seemed that every time it realized I was aware of it, it would take off before I could snap a photo. Except for this time. He flew into the bay to the right of the dock. I never saw where it landed and I used my camera as binoculars to scan the trees on the opposite side of the bay. A few seconds later he was filling up my viewfinder, giving me just enough time to snap this shot.

And then one more as he took off once again.

Last but not least, a solitary image of a sky which appeared to sprout wings of its own as the sun took flight for the night.

Scenes From The Cottage

Below are a few more images taken up at the cottage on our last visit.

A few colourful swimming noodles just waiting for someone to grab them and make splash.

Early one morning, I woke up with the strong sense that Mr. Blue was outside the living room window. I just knew he had to be there. I stumbled into the front room and this magnificent creature greeted me. He let me snap a couple of photos through the glass before he flew off to thrill someone else. I later found two feathers (and a huge load of poop) on the dock.

Just for fun, I snapped a photo of the clothes pegs on the line.

Frank caught this little guy from off of the dock. He had to perform a bit of surgery to remove the hook which the fish swallowed. You can see the red metal in its mouth. A few seconds later our finned friend was reunited with the lake

This is a peek of the sun-kissed lake water as it appears between two trees.

Between two other trees, you can relax in the hammock to watch the sunset.

And here it is. I hope you love it as much as we did.

Osprey Marsh

One day last month, Frank and I drove over to a place just a few minutes from my home called Osprey Marsh.

We'd heard about it before but had never been there. The day was overcast, and a storm seemed like a possibility, so we didn't venture too far from where we parked, just in case. We were armed with our respective cameras, lenses and a backpack which carried water and a light lunch if we were lucky enough to avoid bad weather.

We wandered the area, and though we didn't see any Osprey, for which the marsh is named, we did see a few birds and other things, in the hour or so that it took us to explore.

As we approached the marsh, we saw a Great Blue Heron fishing. It's a sight we see often but it was his catch that was most impressive. He had his back to us for a short while and we could see that he had a rather large fish in his bill. Frank, being the astute and knowledgeable fisherman that he is (he wrote the book, after all), knew what it was at a glance.

Just before he flew off with his catch, the heron turned toward us and confirmed Frank's call. He had a huge Brown Bullhead Catfish. He carried it a short distance away and enjoyed his meal.

We looked for, but didn't see any frogs among these lovely lily pads, but the water lily was certainly worth stopping for and admiring.

Nearby, a family of mallards wandered past. The young appeared to be maturing toward adulthood - probably teenagers.

And further down the shoreline, Mother and Father Goose kept watchful eyes as their five goslings took a nap on the beach.

Frank focused on this snail with his camera, and I decided to snap a shot of it with my own. I'm sure he has a similar image somewhere on his hard drive.

On our way out toward the car, we saw these lovely mini orchids or iris-like flowers. They were quite tiny.

The weather held out long enough for us to find a bench, and munch on a few of the goodies we'd packed. We headed for home after lunch. When we were seconds away from the car, the rain began.

Sometimes, these things work out just perfectly.

A Walk in the Park

It's time to join me for a walk in the park. Grab a hat and some sunscreen. These hazy days are deceiving.

Fresh as a daisy.

Twin Iris. Born of the same stalk.

Frank pointed out this young Robin primping.

And preening.

A duckling explores the water and comes up empty-billed.

Our local Painted turtle basking in the sunlight on the slope of the dam. The water sparkles behind him.

Up above him, Mr. Blue does a fly-by.

I hope you enjoyed our walk around the pond. Can I pour you a coffee?

This was a scheduled post. I will not be able to return visits for about a few more days because I am away at the cottage. I do have some more scheduled posts though, and they will be coming up soon.