Annual Raptor Post

Everyone seems to thoroughly enjoy this post every year, so I keep sharing. If you're someone who's eeked out by birds, you may want to navigate away now. If you're someone who geeks out on birds, enjoy!

: : : : :

We had an outstanding week banding raptors in Cape May for the Cape May Raptor Banding Project this year. (FYI, this is NOT something I do because of my job. I actually take a vacation to volunteer with this project.) More birds in our short time there than we've ever had before. Monday we had 53 birds through the blind! Talk about ringin' (banding) and slingin' (releasing)! A dozen birds were in the blind at one point. I was the one processing that day. It was beautiful chaos. So many Accipiters (sharp-shinned and Cooper's hawks)!

Notable birds banded throughout the week were: red-tailed hawks (RTHA), northern harriers (my spirit bird)(NOHA), merlins, a red-shouldered hawk, sharp-shinned hawks (SSHA), Coopers hawks (COHA), a northern goshawk (NOGO). Of these, we had a wealth of adults, which was a thrill. Usually, we're dealing with hatch year birds.

Birds seen but not banded: golden eagles, bald eagles, kestrels, peregrine falcons. Of these, we had some pretty close calls with the latter three. Peregrines are always an absolute BLAST to watch hunting with their acrobatic diving at top speeds. We even had a juvenile bald eagle come into the station for a serious look, but he ended up swooping off to perch in a nearby snag. An adult bald also looked like it would come in, but dropped last minute into the marsh (to never be seen again).

Acronyms to keep in mind: HY = hatch year, SY = second year, and ASY = after second year.

Without further ado, have a photo dump of birds of prey!

HY COHA

With our "Well, this is hawkward" shirts holding SSHAs
Mandy is the reason these trips happen every year <3

Sunrise over the marsh; the view from our blind

HY MERL

ASY SSHA

ASY SSHA

HY male NOHA; sorry in advance for the wealth of harrier photos, I love them

ASY COHA - look at that eye!!

ASY COHA after release

HY female NOHA

HY female NOHA

Adult feathers coming in on the HY female NOHA's tail (center)

HY RTHA - with the most beautiful tail for a HY bird! 

They don't turn red until they're adults, but this one had a jump on it. Gorgeous red in the banding.

HY RTHA

Thrilled to death with this harrier in hand. I got photos with *every* harrier this year.
May share the collage of "Liz with Harriers" at a later date lol
HY female NOHA

HY female NOHA

You can see her adult vs. hatch year tail feathers once again (most every HY harrier we saw had this)

HY female NOHA

SY male NOHA - male NOHA's turn a beautiful grey in their adult years and are called "grey ghosts"
Their eyes are also a goregous, striking yellow.

Sunset lighting on our marsh.

HY male NOHA; you can see how his light colored eyes will eventually trend to yellow like the above bird

HY RTHA

HY RTHA

HY RTHA

ASY male MERL, also known as "blue jacks" for their dark blueish plummage

ASY male MERL

HY male NOGO; the noisiest bird you'll ever meet!
They also will ATTACK you if you're within ~500 feet of their nests when the nest is active.

HY male NOGO

Appalachian Autumn

This year was definitely lacking in color compared to last year. Regardless, I still tried my best to capture some of the autumn splendor that did emerge.

Roaring Plains

Roaring Plains

Roaring Plains

Tree pose on the Roaring Plains promontory

My momma posing at the Roaring Plains promontory

Bickles Knob and the Monongahela Nat'l Forest

Bickles Knob and the Monongahela Nat'l Forest

Bickles Knob and the Monongahela Nat'l Forest

And don't forget, if you're able to donate to help the Lakota who are standing up to DAPL, please email me at estout18 (at) gmail (dot) com and I'll let you know how to direct the payment.

Happy weekend to you and yours!

Scavenger Hunt Sunday

Hosted weekly by Ramblings and Photos

1. Beneath your feet - He's never far from me.

2. Capturing movement - I love him.  And I love when he plays with me!

3. Texture - All the saw dust and crumblings from the many trees and branches that have been cut.

4. Face your fears - taken with my cell phone, this behemoth was sitting outside my front door on Thursday.  I didn't kill it, but I didn't like it either!

5. Currently - Currently I'm hiking somewhere in West Virginia, but no matter where I am this fire will be burning.  Its been burning for well over a week now.  We've cut down a lot of dead trees and numerous branches that needed trimmed lately in our yard.   And when I say "we" I mean dad and the boys. 

Another memorable weekend

As of today, I've been a college graduate for a year.  Eerie.  In less than a month I'll have been at my current job for a  year.  Double eerie.

This weekend the rest of my close friends graduated from college, though I only saw three of them walk (and only have photos of the two posted on the web as the other ignores all things social media).

Mr. Graduate and I.  He's headed west to CO later this summer for his new job.  Congratulations, dear.

Our Big Sky crew.  Yes, I'm blinding white, don't hate.  I like to think of it as "cancer-free".

It was fun to get to watch Chris make that walk across the stage, shake hands, fist pump, and grin excessively. He completed a dual major in aerospace and mechanical engineering.  Completed it cum laude.  A daunting task that few accomplish.  Fist-pump worthy, indeed.

Photo by one of Chris' family members

: : : : :

I had the pleasure of doing the engagement shoot for our Big Sky trip friends this weekend, too.  It was the first time I've done such a lengthy shoot (~2 hours).  My editing skills are growing with this new load of experiences lately though, for that I'm thankful.  Granted, if I keep up shoots like this I'm going to have to start charging something.  I'll never be huge, but it would be nice to make a little something to help support the hobby and be able to provide more to any future clients.

I think the shots turned out beautifully.  I'm very please and the couple (+ family & friends) seem very pleased, as well, and that's what really matters.

: : : : :

Despite my body (and my liver) begging me to go straight home after a weekend of celebration and last-hurrahs, I went to the barn on my way home.  (Can I have a gold star?)

Griffin played his na-na-na-na-na you can't catch me! game for a bit, but did eventually come in.  His herd of 3 has grown to a herd of 9 horses.  They're a pretty site to see on that lush pasture, bay roans, overo paints, a grey, a dun, a sorrel, a purlino, and a black.

I touched up G-man's tootsies and then suited him up with the surcingle and tossed him in the round pen to warm up.  Once he was chill and paying attention, I tossed on a side-pull bridle and long-reins.  I pushed him away from me into a few more circles and reverses with the long reins skipping along beside and behind him to let him figure things out.  He high-stepped a little, but no reaction otherwise.

Then we just jumped into the whole ground driving thing head first.

I've read some literature on it and knew what he should be able to do prior to beginning ground driving, and from the steps on articles I've read he can already do the pre-requisites.  Excellent.

I praised him for standing still, and then worked my way behind him, snapped the lines together, and gave a cluck and shake of the reins.

He walked forward, heading to the panels and around in a circle just as if I were in the center asking him to move around me.  Good horse.

I prepared to reverse, loosened one rein and applying pressure to the other.  We turned.

I had to straighten him out a few times, and we had one or two misunderstandings with him wanting to turn and face me instead of moving forward, but not bad!

We reversed direction several times.  We halted successfully several times.  And we even trotted for a revolution.  Good horse!

Its weird for me, and weird for him, but he's listening to me and giving to pressure.  I can't ask for much more from our first lesson.  He's a little superstar in the making.