an interesting day...

the common mergansers continue their dance close to the shoreline; indeed,
for a few short minutes, comic relief was had when the male came up with a
fairly large catfish, and he skittered away. a female gave chase and lo,
she took it from him... they spent the next 3 minutes wandering the park
side of the bay... when at last we left our happy couple, he had given up,
and she was less hungry...

a few of the tree swallows have been back for the better part of a week. i
can hardly wait for the mass influx... the female redwinged-black birds are
also starting to reappear, and the virginia rails are turning on their
stupid genes... two were seen flying into the reeds next to the western
boardwalk... a wilson's snipe was spotted in the same vicinity, seen only
because it flew in as well...

at least two adult bald eagles soared on thermals with a juvenile after
divebombing a raft of cormorants, coots and ducks, and two (other?) adults
did much the same about 30 minutes later, on their way to juanita...

the other highlight of the day: a great blue heron going after a fairly
large (norway?) rat, consuming it with gusto... some of this was caught for
posterity, and will be posted to the website when we next have a rainy day
:)

00 caren
http://www.parkgallery.org
juanita bay
--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Anti-Virus.
Version: 7.0.308 / Virus Database: 266.6.2 - Release Date: 2005.03.04