Viewing nature with Eileen

  Welcome to Saturday's Critters! Hello and Happy Saturday!

 If you love all God's creatures like I do and also like to blog about them and take critter photos this is where you can share your critter post. Link up your post and share your critters, join in with my critter party ! You can share any kind of critters the real ones, pretend ones, statues and paintings, a new or old post!

A mish-mash of photos from early August. 

Click on images for better viewing.

1. Aug 4th my walk with Miney to the lake. I found a Red-eared Slider Turtle and some Canada Geese across the lake. 

2. Aug 6th, our walk with Miney on the NCR trail. Hubby was walking with us part of the way. 

3. Aug 7th, A local Prettyboy fire road walk with Miney. 

4. Aug 8th, another walk to the lake with Miney. We saw some Double-crested Cormorants and the Slider Turtles were a distance away. A Northern Flicker perched high on a tree. 

I am sharing a closer look at the Northern Flicker in my yard, they are beautiful birds.

5. Aug 11th,  I have been enjoying watching the Ruby-throated Hummingbirds zooming around my yard. The male likes to sit right on top of the feeder, he guards his feeder from all the other hummingbirds. 

6. Below are the Monarch Butterfly, the Eastern Tiger Swallowtail and the Black Swallowtail. There are times our buddleia bush is filled with butterflies, looks magical. 

The Eastern Tiger Swallowtail butterfly sharing a bloom with a Black Swallowtail. 

7. Flashback Florida 2017, The Roseate Spoonbill has a long flat spoon-shaped bill. This shot shows just how flat the bill is. The first three photos were taken at Lake Parker Park in Lakeland, Fl.

8. Immature Roseate Spoonbills are a paler pink. Their pink color is derived from their diet. They eat frogs and aquatic insects and very small fish. The next two images were taken at the Circle B Bar Reserve in Lakeland Fl.

The Roseate Spoonbills lately are showing up up and down the Atlantic Coast. I believe there were 4-5 in Delaware seen at Bombay Hook NWR and 5-6 in Southern Maryland. 

Sept 15th, there was some excitement in our neighborhood, with a few of our neighbors helping a public works employee having to fend off a bear. The worker was checking out the health of trees in the watershed when a bear was bluff charging her, my neighbors were out walking their dog and tried helping the worker. We are not sure, maybe the bear had cubs it was protecting. The worker had some scratches from a fall and was driven back to the street in a neighbor's 4 wheeler and a policemen with a gun escorted our neighbors back to the road. We were at lunch with the family and missed all this excitement. 

I am linking up to Heidrun's Mosaic Monday   I hope you can stop by and visit Heidrun and check out the Mosaic Monday post.

Thanks to all my visitors and for your past and present comments. Stop back to see any replies to your comments. I appreciate everyone who loves and respects wildlife. Thank you for linking up a critter post.

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Thank you for sharing your critters and post! 

Welcome to Saturday's Critters!

Hello and happy Saturday!

 If you love all God's creatures like I do and also like to blog about them and take critter photos this is where you can share your critter post. Link up your post and share your critters, join in with my critter party ! You can share any kind of critters the real ones, pretend ones, statues and paintings, a new or old post!

On Aug 2-3rd hubby and I managed a getaway to visit Bombay Hook NWR in Delaware and Blackwater NWR in Cambridge Md.  It was time to see some shorebirds before they headed south. 

Click on photos for larger viewing.

1. Some views of Bombay Hook NWR and the wildlife drive, one of ponds, Semipalmated Plovers and Black-necked Stilts.

2. We were happy to see the 4 Roseate Spoonbills that were being seen at Bombay Hook NWR. They were a distance from the wildlife drive and they were spaced too far apart to capture all 4 in one photo. I did mange to catch 3 of the Roseate Spoonbills along with a Mute Swan and some ducks. 

3. Below a popular gathering spot for the birds, Great Egrets, Snowy Egrets and a possible Little Egret along with Laughing Gulls, Terns, Canada Geese and ducks. I am guessing tern with the bright orange beak is a Caspian Tern? 

4. Bombay Hook NWR is a great place to see the Black-necked Stilt.

5.  A Great Blue Heron and a Tricolored Heron on the top row and the bottom row is various shorebirds, Egrets, Canada Geese and ducks on the left and on the right are the Roseate Spoonbills with some Mute Swans. 

6. We watched the Canada Geese taking off a few times, they flew by our car. 

7. So far away, in the background are the 4 Rosate Spoonbills, their pink color stands out a little. In the foreground are Mallards, Canada Geese and some Egrets. 

8. I am guessing at all the birds top line below, unknown juvenile Tern, Yellowlegs and 2 Dowitchers. Not the best photo for id's, Lesser or Greater, Short-billed or Long-billed. Bottom row are 2 Semipalmated Plovers and 3 Wood Ducks. 

9. A family of Black-necked Stilts with one Glossy Ibis..

10. One of the many Great Blue Heron's seen along the wildlife drive. 

11. The Tricolored Heron taking a break from it's foraging for food.

12.  A few Wood Ducks seen below. 

The Roseate Spoonbills are showing up all over the place now, there are being seen in Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, Virginia, Pennsylvania and some other states. Other birds usually seen in Florida are showing up here too, Black-bellied Whistling Ducks, a Wood Stork and a Limpkin in Maryland. Are these birds on the move looking for food?  The reason for their appearance, I do not know. After two loops around the wildlife drive we left Bombay Hook NWR in Delaware and headed to Blackwater NWR in Cambridge Md. We spent the night in a nearby Easton Md hotel, so we could do the Blackwater NWR wildlife drive early in the morning. I will make another post on my sightings at the Blackwater NWR. 

I am also linking up to Anni's blog party found here I'd Rather B Birding   Anni always has some beautiful birds to be seen on her blog, check it out!

Here is my linky:

YOU are all # 1.

Thanks to all my visitors and for your comments. Stop back to see any replies to your comments. I appreciate everyone who loves critters and has linked up their critter post.