Morning Hike at Guadalupe River Park and Gardens
16 February 2008
San Jose, California
It's so nice to see that spring is upon us! |
This time I turned the tables on Ellen and snapped a picture of her and one of her beasties (Tika) who joined us on the walk. But she also got one of me with her other beastie (Boost). For Ellen's pictures and narration, visit her site. |
I was surprised to see all these pepper berries hanging on this tree since the squirrels in my neighborhood tend to strip all the berries (with help from the birdies) in the fall and early winter. |
The "river" wasn't very clear, but it was very still in this area and I liked the reflective effect on the water. |
The ubiquitous American Coot paddling along the river. |
It was hard to spot this Spotted Sandpiper picking its way along the rocks when it was standing still. Fortunately for me, it did move along on occasion. |
Quick! How many Killdeer can you count in this picture? I'll give you a hint: When I took this picture, I was only seeing TWO on the far side of the river. There's a more close-up view of three of them right below here... along with the answer. |
Believe it or not, there are ten (10) of these guys in the first photo! |
Here's a nice, fluffy, Snowy Egret. The big difference between this guy and our other big, white egret (the Great Egret) is the black bill on this guy (as opposed to the big yellow bill on the Great Egret). The Snowy is also smaller and has black on his legs, tho you can't tell from this photo. |
Here's another view of Snowy Egret. It demonstrates the black legs quite nicely as well as the reason the indigenous peoples call it "Yellow Slippers" or "Golden Slippers." |
Here's a lovely Western Grebe doing what Western Grebes do. |
And a lovely, reflective photo of another American Coot. |
We managed to catch a Scrub Jay who wasn't being very shy. Actually, it was apparently out gathering twigs, probably as nesting material. The rest of the shots I got all had its face obscured by a gigantic twig. The big difference between this guy and our other jay (Steller's Jay) is that the Steller's has a black head that is topped with a pointy, black crest. |
These were so very spring-y that I took another few pictures on the way back to the car. |
After our hike we ended up back at Ellen's. Her place backs up to a big open field. This is one of the denizens of the field: Foxy Loxy. |
