There is so much false advertising around me in the "falls" department. Take Chippewa Falls for example: Its water spilling over a dam. Sorry, but thats not a falls. They should be called Chippewa Dam, to eliminate confusion. Minneapolis actually has a real falls, right in the middle of the city even, and inconspicuously hidden behind a wall.
It seems like only yesterday these little buddies were knee-high to a grasshopper. Now look at 'em.
Wood Duck
Look at all the kids that are hanging out at the lake, this is quite the little herd of wood ducks:
Mallards are getting huge.
Watching over all this are mostly red-winged blackbirds.
Cedar Waxwings, I must say, are pretty darn cute. I love their masks. They remind me of Batman. And this small flock (about 8) were systematically stripping the petals from this tree, and were apparently enjoying it enough that they didn't seem to care I walked right up to them. It was great entertainment.
Sunday was such a great day of banding that I still have more birds to share. These shots are all much closer and more detailed than I've managed to get before. First lets start with yet another new species for me, the aptly named Black and White Warbler:
I saw my first redstart a few days earlier but only managed to get a blurry far-away shot. Here we see the halloween-themed bird in focus. The one we are looking at is a male that is almost 3 years old, and we know this because only males have these bold colors. Females, juveniles, and even 1-year old males are actually mostly gray and yellow.
I've shared Yellow Warblers before, but this one was just so pretty and close, how could I not post it too:
I have found yellowthroats before, but again, the cuteness factor requires me to put these up too:
Tennessee Warbler: Vermivora peregrina.
Note the color here, it is a beautiful olive-green on its back.
Early in the day, we were thrown off by the extremely yellow throats, as shown here:
At the same time we pulled that one out of the net, I caught another one apparently feeding from the nearby plum blossoms. Not sure if they were going just for the nectar, or for bugs or something else that was feeding there, or maybe they just thought the bees were slacking and needed help pollinating.
So, that does confirm that it was just a whole lot of pollen on them. It showed though that even with a bird in-hand, there are external factors that can change the apparent color of the bird.
This took a while to post because I had so many shots to go through (a good problem to have though). Check out the blues on this Indigo Bunting (a species first for me):
I saw my first Eastern Bluebird of the year.
There have been a few Rose-breasted Grosbeaks in the area, but this is the first one I was able to get close to.
The bunting decided to chat it up with some American Goldfinch ladies at the thistle feeder, and there were a half dozen males also in the area.
I'm off now to go banding, so there will be many more shots to come.
