I ended my walk at the pond today feeling like a news editor trying to pick the lead story of the day. Three laps around the pond yielded a host of images and tons of excitement. Unlike an editor, I’m going to present the occurrences as they came about.
It started with a nice still shot of a lily – which just happened to have the littlest busy bee within its petals. (Click on the photo above to enlarge it and spy the bee. Use your back arrow to return to the post.)
A quarter of the way into my first lap, I met up with a neighbor who enjoys fishing. He’d had a successful afternoon, returning all his catches to their water home. He graciously entertained me with no hint of resenting my interruption to the peace of his hobby. In fact, he narrated his fishing as he cast several times and brought in two fish in the twenty or so minutes I stood by him with camera ready. Through his talk, I learned a good deal about fishing at this pond and fishing in general. Here is his first catch, caught digitally.
I should say that this fisherman removes the barbs from his hooks to minimize the injury to the fish. This ten inch striped bass (correct?) seemed a bit dazed but otherwise a-okay as it was returned to the water.
With this little eight incher, the fisherman showed me how healthy the fish of the pond are this year. How beautiful! It, too, was happy to return to the water.
An interesting interlude occurred just as I was about to move along from the fishing. The black snake I wrote about yesterday appeared at the feet of the fisherman. Whatever doubt he’d had about my earlier description of it, was solidly debunked. It was as big as I had described and as dark as I’d described and without markings. He tells me it’s a ‘Black Snake’ – that’s the name of it.
Just a couple of days ago I wrote about the Red-winged Blackbird. Rounding a corner I came upon a flock of them. If you enlarge this photo (by clicking on it) you’ll see the fleck of red on some of the wings. (Scrolling down through two posts, you’ll see much better detail.)
My apologies ahead of time if you’ve seen enough of the Heron. But, the one at the pond today was huge. In fact, as the fisherman saw it take off he exclaimed, “The wing-span must be five feet!”
Next up….more babies! This time they are chicks! They are the offspring of the bird I couldn’t identify in yesterday’s post, which is, says the fisherman, a Mallard. I watched a pair of Mallards all through the early spring, and the ‘she’ did not have this tuft on her head. Nor do any of the pictures I find in my resources. But, perhaps she goes through changes in a season, or after the birth of her brood. Here they are – five little ducklings – all with Mama’s Cleopatra eyes!!!
For comparison, here is a picture of a pair of Mallards from the early spring. The female is on the right.
These presentations of the pond happened over the course of two laps. Since I’d not yet achieved the cardiovascular benefit of a good walk, I took one more quick lap. Half way around, as if to be sure my tenderness toward the turtle were not displaced, this one paddled languidly by. Its shell is about twelve inches. (Click on the photo for better detail.)
It was a great day at the pond.
SilverLining 