6.2.17 ~ Avery Pond, Groton, Connecticut great egret by Timothy Rodgers
The camera is an excuse to be someplace you otherwise don’t belong. It gives me both a point of connection and a point of separation. ~ Susan Meiselas (Whitney Museum of American Art: Handbook of the Collection)
black-crowned night heron (?) by Timothy Rodgers
One evening last week Tim took the camera down to the beach and the salt pond and came home with these beautiful shots! I’m pretty sure the bird above is a black-crowned night heron, but if I’m wrong I hope someone will correct me…
swan by Timothy Rodgers
The swan, like the soul of the poet, By the dull world is ill understood. ~ Heinrich Heine (Early Poems, Evening Songs)
swan and cygnet by Timothy Rodgers
When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence. ~ Ansel Adams (3000 Astounding Quotes)
double-crested cormorant by Timothy Rodgers
Photography takes an instant out of time, altering life by holding it still. ~ Dorothea Lange (Ancestors in the Attic: Making Family Memorabilia into History)
courting pair of double-crested cormorants by Timothy Rodgers
8.27.16 ~ probably a juvenile great black-backed gull
So… Yesterday there were three cormorants sitting on the breakwater, closer to land than I’ve ever seen them before. But, confound it, still too far away for a decent picture. And of course, they had no interest in spreading their wings out to dry. So tantalizingly close by, yet still so far away…
8.27.16 ~ cormorants on the end of the breakwater at high tide
However, in my efforts to get as close as I could to the cormorants, I discovered a large group of gulls wading in the rocky pools created by high tide.
8.27.16 ~ herring gull, wading
8.27.16 ~ herring gull, rock climbing
8.27.16 ~ herring gull, waiting for the next wave to cool off his feet
A few days ago my gull friend with the mangled foot came back! He was sitting on the white post in front of us as we sat down on a bench to eat our supper. 🙂 He took off several times, soaring up high and circling around the beach house and landing each time again on the post in front of us. I think he was trying to demonstrate that he was just fine, thank you. He seems so healthy and energetic now — he must have recovered from whatever malady was troubling him earlier this summer.
8.27.16 ~ look who is back!!!
Yesterday I spotted him hanging out with the other gulls on the rocks. He was getting a drink of water. Gulls are able to drink salt water or fresh water.
8.27.16
8.27.16 ~ posing for me – doesn’t he look sprightly?
My family thinks I should come up with a name for him but for some reason I can’t think of one. I’m also not even sure if “he” is male or female.
8.27.16 ~ more drinking
8.27.16 ~ so refreshing!
8.27.16
After his thirst was quenched he decided to walk over to investigate a noisy group of gulls nearby.
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8.27.16 ~ walking with a sense of purpose
8.27.16 ~ pausing to listen and contemplate
Meanwhile, another herring gull walked into view. He’s pretty handsome, too.
8.27.16 ~ another herring gull
It seemed like everyone wanted their pictures taken!
8.27.16 ~ another juvenile great black-backed gull
8.27.16 ~ juvenile great black-backed gull
I’m still amazed that the juvenile great black-baked gulls are larger than the adult herring gulls. In fact, they are the largest species of gull in the world.
We didn’t see any laughing gulls this day, who are smaller than the herring gulls, but had seen several of them a few days beforehand.
8.27.16 ~ Mystic Whaler heading out for a dinner cruise…
Summer is winding down, but it’s still hazy, hot and humid. We are close to setting a record for the hottest August in Connecticut weather history. Sigh… Looking forward to October!
Live in each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influences of each. ~ Henry David Thoreau (Journal, August 23, 1853)
7.31.16 ~ juvenile great black-backed gull ~ photo by Timothy Rodgers
Well, I’m sad to report that I haven’t seen my gull friend with the mangled foot since our encounter on July 10th… I have a strong feeling that he was indeed saying good-bye.
Sunday afternoon a different gull with an injured foot limped over to us to see what food we might offer him. He’s young so he hasn’t learned yet that most humans follow the rules and don’t feed the gulls. While I’m pretty sure our old friend was a herring gull, our new friend is much larger, perhaps a juvenile great black-backed gull.
Of course I was without camera, but I made sure to bring it with me yesterday. The sky was striking. But our new friend wasn’t there.
8.1.16 ~ light and dark, late afternoon sun
8.1.16 ~ laughing gull portrait
On Sunday the parking lot had been full of laughing gulls, but yesterday there was only one, and he perched near us, watching us eat. The laughing gulls don’t usually hang out on the white posts. It seems everyone is behaving differently these days!
8.1.16 ~ snowy egret at Beach Pond
As we left for home I spotted this bird wading in the nearly dried up salt water pond. Connecticut is in a moderate drought. We have many great egrets but this one was smaller and I wondered if it was a young one. He was too far away to get a decent picture.
8.1.16 ~ snowy egret at Beach Pond
Imagine my surprise when I enlarged a few of the pictures and noticed his yellow feet! Pretty sure this identifies him as a snowy egret, which is smaller than the great egret.
8.1.16 ~ snowy egret at Beach Pond
8.1.16 ~ semipalmated sandpiper
Not sure what kind of little shorebird this but he sure looked cute exploring the exposed pond bed. So many appearances in the flow of life…
8.1.16 ~ semipalmated sandpiper
The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance. ~ Alan Watts (The Wisdom of Insecurity)
You do not ask a tame seagull why it needs to disappear from time to time toward the open sea. It goes, that’s all, and it is as simple as a ray of sunshine, as normal as the blue of the sky. ~ Bernard Moitessier (The Long Way)
Now that our son and daughter-in-law have returned home to Georgia our house is so very quiet… Yesterday for lunch we went to the beach. The weather was cool and damp and there were very few people there. I wasn’t the only one wearing a sweatshirt. At first we didn’t see our friendly gull.
7.10.16 ~ there was a crow raising quite a ruckus, all by himself, leaving us wondering what all the fuss was about
7.10.16 ~ a mother Canada goose swam by with two children
7.10.16 ~ gull monitoring Long Island Sound from the rooftop
Disappointed that we hadn’t seen our friend, we started to walk back to our car and then we saw him, standing on the sidewalk, almost as if he was waiting for us. He was quiet – no vocalizations this day.
So I got down on the grass and talked to him for a while. He sat down and allowed me to get closer than ever before. This time I had my camera!
After getting the picture above I pressed my luck and got the portrait at the top of this post. What a thrill! Somehow he knows we can be trusted. But again, he seems old and tired. I wonder if we will ever see him standing on one of the white posts this summer. Maybe those days are over. We’ll see…
Our son and daughter-in-law are visiting us from Georgia. Last night we went down to the beach for supper and a gull came over near to our picnic table. He was resting quietly on the grass for a while, and then he started voicing all kinds of mournful cries. We spoke to him a little bit and then, he stood up. That’s when I noticed his mangled foot and recognized him to be the gull I wrote about last September in this post: a long fine life.
So, he made it through the winter after all!
I had been a little sad I hadn’t seen him until now, fearing he hadn’t survived. But then one of Tim’s ham radio contacts mentioned a gull fitting his description was visiting a dock about a mile up the river. People were feeding him, which they shouldn’t do, but perhaps that’s why he hadn’t been down to the beach.
The gull then walked over to my side of the picnic table and sat down again. I spoke to him for a little while, unable to conceal my excitement over seeing him again. 🙂 I didn’t have my camera but he sat still while I got out my cell phone and snapped this picture.
In the past he would visit us by standing on whichever white post was closest to us. This is the first time he was sitting on the grass. And he vocalized for much longer than he has in the past. I like to think he was telling us about his winter and his plans for the summer.
Finally, he flew off and started hovering over a man with a hot dog in his hand. Still up to his old tricks… It was so good to see him.
6.25.16 ~ we celebrated the summer solstice on Saturday good friends, good food and good fun…
6.25.16 ~ bald eagle
6.25.16 ~ gray catbird
6.25.16 ~ downy woodpecker
6.25.16 ~ downy woodpecker taking off
6.25.16 ~ petunias
6.25.16 ~ daylily
6.25.16 ~ foxglove
6.25.16 ~ daylily
6.25.16 ~ fairy light
as close as I could get to this doe before she stomped her forefeet at me ~ I backed off so she could graze in peace…
6.25.16 ~ chipmunk
6.25.16 ~ so many orbs on a magical night
6.25.16 ~ after a long day of fun in the sun, a fire to enjoy under a clear sky full of shimmering stars, with fireflies glowing in the surrounding trees, and fairy lights sparkling near the grass…
First rehearse this song by note, To each word a warbling note, Hand in hand with fairy grace, Will we sing and bless this place. ~ William Shakespeare (A Midsummer Night’s Dream)
