birds – Page 3 – Rainwater Rambling

Day 10: North Shore and Fisherman’s Wharf

August 31, 2015 richardt

PEI2015

We headed up to the north shore today to visit the PEI National Park beaches. We had a lazy morning before heading out, here is Claudia relaxing on the deck.

We started at Stanhope Beach.

It was pretty empty.

The girls playing monkey in the middle.

Claudia mermaid.

It was windy and the fine sand on the beach was blowing around. We packed up after a couple of hours and headed to another beach. We stopped at the Covehead Harbour Lighthouse. It was built in 1975 and was never manned. It is also one of the smallest lighthouses on the island.

Not drifting snow, but drifting sand.

After the lighthouse we headed to Brackley Beach, however it was even windier there and we didn’t last very long with the blowing sand.

Tonight’s dinner was at the Fisherman’s Wharf in North Rustico. It is an all you can eat salad bar, which includes seafood chowder and steamed mussels.

We all ordered the lobster add-on to the meal. The seafood chowder was very good and I ate probably a few pounds of mussels.

We needed to walk around a bit after dinner so we went out to the North Rustico Harbour lighthouse.

It was built in 1876 and was electrified in 1960. It is one of the few lighthouses that didn’t have the dwelling removed when it was de-staffed.

Some of the sights around the harbour.

We started back for the cottage via Cavendish. We stopped at Orby Head. There were lots of Great Cormorants (Phalacrocorax carbo) in trees and flying around.

I was able to get some close up shots with my telephoto lens.

This is close up of Orby Head, a trade off when using a telephoto lens. There were a few idiots hitting golf balls into the ocean from the top of the cliff. Have they not seen Seinfeld?

It started to rain as we left Cavendish, it was quite the lightening show as we drove back, just after we got into the cottage, it poured down rain. Most of the rain has occurred in the evening, overnight or early morning.

Day 6: A Rainy Day

August 27, 2015 richardt

PEI2015

birds pei tamzooka

The rain started around 4:00 in the morning and went for most of the day until 3:30 pm. Charlottetown received 59.8mm of rain. We went into town to buy some groceries and find the Asian Food Store, we found it, but it was tiny and not much Japanese food. By the time the rains stopped, it coincided with low tide. Angela and I went down to the beach and there was so much rain that it created a temporary waterfalls.

While Angela and I were beach combing, we heard a little rumble and saw some of the rocks slide down.

The sun came out just in time to bbq the salmon we bought yesterday. There was a Blue Jay (Cyanocitta crostata) flying back and forth across the yard.

The early evening sky after dinner.

Day 3: Herons, Mosquitos and Lighthouses

August 24, 2015 richardt

PEI2015

birds lighthouse pei tamzooka

It was another lazy day, the girls were down to the beach to hunt for sea glass, it is an odd time for tides, we are only getting one low tide a day and it is falling right in the middle of the day. The mornings start our cloudy and by noon the sun comes out and burns off the clouds. When we went back down there were three Great Blue Herons on the beach.

Two of the birds flew off, but one of them stuck around.

The girls were walking towards the bird and eventually it flew off.

It was hot and sunny, and about 10 degrees cooler at the water then up at the cottage.

There have also been a lot of mosquitos around, both down at the water and up at the cottage.

In the afternoon we headed out to the east side of the island, somewhere we didn’t get to last time. We made a stop at Prim Point.

Prim Point Light Station is the first and oldest lighthouse on Prince Edward Island. It was built in 1845 and only one of a few round brick lighthouses in Canada.

On the way to the lighthouse there was this tree decorated with various fishing boat floats.

From Prim Point we made our way up to Montague and then back to the cottage.

Day 2: Beachcombing and Lobster Dinner

August 23, 2015 richardt

PEI2015

birds pei tamzooka

We had quite the thunderstorm last night and lots of rain, according to Environment Canada Charlottetown received 74mm on Saturday. We missed low tide the first day we arrived, today it was at 11:30am. The girls and I went down early when it was going out and started hunting around for some sea glass. Claudia found a dead crab.

It was still a cloudy morning. Here is the stairway that comes down from our cottage.

After brunch the sun came out and we headed back down for low tide. The tide isn’t that low, but it will get lower as the week goes on.

There is a Great Blue Heron (Ardea hernias) that hangs around.

Susan looking for some sea glass.

The girls venturing further over to the sand bars.

I was following the heron as it kept moving away.

It was a hot and humid day. The sun was out for most of the day, but it rained when we went into town.

Getting closer to the heron.

About as far as the girls went in the water. The water wasn’t that cold.

When we got back to the cottage the power was out so we headed into town for some supplies. When we got back it was still out, if it stayed off it was going to interrupt our dinner plans. The owners hooked up a generator to keep the water filtration going, but it only left the bbq as an option for cooking. The power came on about 30 minutes after we got back. That meant we could go pick up dinner.

We bought four live 1.5lb lobsters and brought them back to the cottage.

The inside of our cottage.

The first two lobsters were ready.

Claudia and Angela digging in.

After dinner we watched the sunset.

The end of a good day in PEI.

Here is the cottage we are staying in, the Wild Rose. We ended the evening with a fire and smore’s, we had to go old school and carve a stick to roast the marshmallows.

Angela’s Final Soccer Game

August 8, 2015 richardt

Rainwater

angela birds soccer

Today was Angela’s final soccer game of the season, it was the playoffs, with only four teams this year, it was lose one and done.

This is how close my telephoto lens can get the planes in the sky from my lawn chair on the field.

It was a close game early on, but by half time, the other team was up 2-0.

Angela played defence the entire game.

Lots of of pushing and shoving going on throughout the game. It almost looks like they are doing the 3-legged race. I think the final score was 4-1.

There was a hawk that was flying around the marsh and would come to rest in one of the trees.

A Week in the Eastern Townships

June 26, 2015 richardt

Work Posts

birds capmon insects quebec tamzooka

I was down in Frelighsburg, Quebec this past week for work installing a new monitoring site. Not much of an opportunity to try out my new lens, but did get a few bird shots. Not sure what this one is, my birding app couldn’t tell me.

A Savannah Sparrow (Passerculus sandwichensis).

Some fungi off the roadway.

There were a lot of Tree Swallows (Tachycineta bicolour) living in boxes on the power poles.

On the drive back to Toronto, we stopped at the Mallorytown OnRoute service centre and came across this sign in the parking lot. Not sure what the attraction was for the bees, but the sign was covered and they were flying around it. Good thing I had my telephoto lens, didn’t have to get that close.

More Backyard Photos

June 6, 2015 richardt

Rainwater

backyard birds tamzooka

I took some moon shots on the last full moon.

The June 2, 2015 full moon from our backyard.

Our new neighbours that moved in last summer have a lot of bird feeders in their yard. Here is one of their feeders with an American Goldfinch (Spinus tristis).

MEC and Christie Pits

July 22, 2012 richardt

Rainwater

baseball birds free outings

Today we headed down to Mountain Equipment Co-op. Here are Angela and Claudia on King Street. Gillian stayed home to study for her physics test tomorrow.

The MEC store on King Street.

The corner of King and Blue Jays Way.

From MEC we headed up to Christie Pits to watch the Toronto Maple Leafs Inter-County Baseball League game. They were playing the Burlington Twins. They almost picked off this guy at second.

Here he is shaking the dirt out of his uniform.

It was a good game, but it was a hot day. This was the second last home game of the season.

The centre fielder, Raul Borjas.

Here is one of the Maple Leafs getting caught in a rundown.

This bird landed a few feet away from me. Shortly after a foul ball came my way.

When we left at the bottom of the 7th inning, the Maple Leafs were up 3-1. The final score was 5-4 Toronto.

A final shot from left field, the guys on the field are the bullpen. It turns out the GM of the Burlington Twins is an old high school gym teacher, Doug Kelcher. The Twins use to be the Mississauga Twins, they played in Meadowvale for a couple of seasons before moving to Burlington.

The girls in their TML baseball hats, the hats were free with the purchase of a raffle ticket. For $2 we each got a New Era baseball hat, not a bad deal.

Robin Fledgling

August 1, 2011 richardt

Rainwater

backyard birds

We have a family of robins nesting in our maple tree in the backyard. It is the first year we have had them. Yesterday when we came back from the baseball game, I let Chloe out the back and she was bounding across the yard, fortunately she did not spot the fledgling sitting on the ground under the tree. We figured we would let nature take its course and left it there undisturbed. We kept the dog out of the back yard for the rest of the day. Here is the mother sitting in the nest.

We think there are still two more fledglings in the nest.

This morning Susan went out and said the bird was still sitting there, later when I took Chloe out it was gone, no where to be seen. Eventually Chloe tracked it down, it was in the back corner garden, the dog was barking at it and the parents were circling overhead. The fledgling made a break for it, the wrong way, eventually it made it over to the other side of the deck towards the front of the house. We thought okay, we can close the side gate and Chloe won’t be able to get it, I threw some evergreen branches in to give it cover. As Chloe and I are sitting at the gate, I could hear it chirping and the parents were keeping a close eye on it. Next thing I know it is hopping past us, again the dog was oblivious to this thing about two feet away. I put up a firewood log barrier to try and lead it back the way it came, but it was just sitting there. Eventually we had to go out. Here is the fledgling that has been all over the backyard.

While I was trying to steer it towards the back garden again, the parents were squawking away, I think they called in their buddies as sparrows were flying around and then we saw this guy on the neighbours back fence. It is a Northern Flicker (Colaptes auratus), a medium sized member of the woodpecker family.

One of the watchful parents. When we came back the fledgling was gone and there was no sign of it anywhere. Hopefully it made its way back to the cover of the back garden or actually figured out how to get air borne.

Baby Bird

May 31, 2009 richardt

Old-Rainwater

backyard birds

The baby bird is still hiding out on our lawn, it goes from our evergreen to the other and back. There is a robin’s nest in the one evergreen, so whenever the mother comes to feed the bird on the ground the robins start squawking and try to chase away the mother bird.

Baby bird

Feeding time.

Feeding time

Baby bird

Rainwater Rambling

Tag: birds

Day 10: North Shore and Fisherman’s Wharf

Day 6: A Rainy Day

Day 3: Herons, Mosquitos and Lighthouses

Day 2: Beachcombing and Lobster Dinner

Angela’s Final Soccer Game

A Week in the Eastern Townships

More Backyard Photos

MEC and Christie Pits

Robin Fledgling

Baby Bird

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Rainwater Rambling

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