And Still More Summer at LRDC!

Mid summer now and things are hot here, as in the rest of the country. Our Bluebirds are fledging their second sets, the Robins are on their third, and we even have a Robin that appears to be attempting to hatch eggs in two separate nests in our winter barn. We cannot be sure yet, but I'll keep you posted on that one! Below was a day on the Connecticut River, a perfect summer day. We cruised for miles, seeing hawks, Bald Eagles, Blue herons, and a host of other fish and game. We pulled our twin Yamahas up on this secluded beach for a cocktail, and watched some several Dragonflies (or darning needles as we called them as children) hatch out. They of course develop and feed in the water, and crawl out when the time and temp is right to metamorphose into the real thing. There were thousands of them...

Below is one arching out of the whole in the back of it's skeleton, kind of a poor picture though...

Here it is, finally free of the old bones. They are almost transparent when they first break out, and wet. They dry in the sun for about 5-10 minutes, and darken. Then they are off and gobbling up bugs!

This is the old shell they are in when they crawl out of the water and onto dry land for the finale..

Below is one resting and drying just a minute or so before she flew off to hover...

And here is one just taking off!

And then, back to the game cameras! This is one long legged brutish looking coyote! I can never tell if he is eating minerals, or just sniffing the scent of all the others that do...

A happy confident young fellow on the far Ridge.

Check out the turkeys in the upper right hand corner of this pic..

Another picture of Mr. Nasty.

I feel fortunate to have spotted this nest. It is the nest and eggs of a Wood Thrush, to me, one of the most musical and lovely birds there is...the bird books almost uniformly state that the Wood Thrushes build their nest in trees, like Robins. I find that is not true. Every Wood Thrush nest I have ever seen around these parts was built on the ground, but looks like a Robin's nest. Can you find the three eggs?

I returned a few days later and took this quiet picture from twelve feet at 10X. I will not intrude on this area again, because unlike Robin's, Wood Thrushes will abandon their nests at the slightest provocation...see her large eyes? That is why they prefer dense vegetation.

Still growing...

Deer in the headlights?

That Coyote must be coming back...

Chow time...

This is called "having your skirt blown up"

And so it goes...This week I will start cleaning up camp as I will host a LRDC hunter's cocktail hour there this week, set up my bow target, and in general just start leaning slightly more toward hunting season than farming...of course second cutting is coming in, so there is more hay to heave, and more river to run with the boats yet, but I can feel the excitement just beginning...

Also we have a winner on the 'guess the bird' contest from the last post! It was in fact a chick-a-dee! Tell me where to send the T-shirt kmurray!

jackzeller@myfairpoint.net