Sunrises and sunsets have been amazing this week.
The hills are still covered with snow. And the floors in the house are covered with grit. My car is covered with mud. Yesterday it was almost sixty degrees, Fahrenheit. And there is snow in this week’s forecast. Spring officially, is only one week away. This is Mud Season.
The girls and I try to get out and walk early when the snow is hard enough to support our weight. Sometimes it supports them but not me. If we are late, then we only have muddy, and in shady places icy, roads to walk on. Yesterday we ran into our friends Frida, Quincy and Mary Ann, also hoping to find a good place to walk. It is a challenge this time of year.
Migratory birds are arriving everyday. One person has already seen a hummingbird in the valley so I put out a feeder. Both bluebirds, Say’s Phoebes, American Robins, Violet-green Swallows and other migrants are already here. They certainly think it’s spring.
Isabella’s
Mount Robinson and Goat Peak
Mountain Bluebird
Shadows
Luna loves the hard snow
aspens
Quincy keeps chasing snowballs he never catches.
Frida tiptoes through the mud puddles
Two male Hairy Woodpeckers
Violet-green Swallows
yarrow
Sky watches
A valentine from my sweetie.
While walking the dogs in a park on the Columbia River, we saw several Bald Eagles, at least five. Two or three of them were juveniles, like this one, and pretty much oblivious to our presence. We were able to walk under the trees where they perched. Most of the time they watched us and the dogs but this one flew, showing off its strength and grace in flight.
Sky and I went to an agility event last weekend and had a chance to stay with friends of a friend who live on a bluff overlooking part of the Salish Sea. It was really very nice of them to take us in. Their little beach is 149 steps down from the their yard and we didn’t mind the walk at all. Sky was excited to smell the saltwater and chew on salty pieces of driftwood. It was pretty chilly so I didn’t throw anything into the water for her to chase. We enjoyed sunset and sunrise colors over the rugged Olympic Mountains. It was a good way to wind down in the evening and to wake up in the morning.
Don’t even ask about our agility results.
149 steps
Alpenglow at sunset
Morning waves
Morning light
Yesterday a friend and I ventured out to the dryland wheat country south of here, across the Columbia and River and up on the plateau in search of Snowy Owls. It was a lovely sunny day. We saw quite a few interesting birds including numerous Rough-legged Hawks, a Prairie Falcon, Snow Buntings, American Kestrels and others. The landscape in that area is criss-crossed with a grid of roads every mile. The north/south roads have letter names – A, B, C, etc. And the east/west roads nave number names. That seems easy enough but often roads don’t go through or are not maintained so navigation can be a challenge. And don’t even think about using a phone app to navigate. No doubt, you will be sent down a road that has not been maintained in many years.
We were sticking to the rougher roads, thinking the owls would be off the beaten path but we were not finding them. We turned down a good paved county road and shortly my friend was slapping the door and saying STOP! There it was, maybe 20 meters off the road perched on the side of big rock outcropping. What a view! We were delighted. For my friend it was a lifer – the first time she had ever seen this species.
We watched it for a while and it seemed pretty unconcerned with our presence and when we left, it was still taking in the warm sun. Snowy Owls nest in the far north on the tundra. They eat lemmings and when there is a shortage of food they migrate farther south in the winter. This year there have been a few of them reported around Washington. It’s always such a treat to see these magnificent wild animals.
Following that we returned down to the big river and watched a variety of water birds and then we went to a park where she had seen Northern Saw-whet Owls recently. We located the white wash on the ground and looking straight up we could see the tiny owl looking down at us.
It was a good day.
This is a male American Kestrel approaching a female on a delicate branch.
My Everyday Photos 