Thursday, August 29, 2013

Home Visitors

 Red-bellied Woodpeckers
 
This was the first juvie we saw in the tree, sitting above Dad and the suet. Looks like a male with a tinge of red on top his head.....
Here's the adult male loading up on suet to feed the juvie.....

Here's the adult female. Only the back half of her head is red. Don't often see the females feeding the youngsters by the suet. Perhaps they have to tend other juvies in the nest?.....
Here's a different smaller, puffier juvie.  Perhaps a female asking if the sparrow was going to feed her!
"Everyone is gone"....
"Guess I'll have to eat by myself!".....
 
One of the "resident" squirrels has found it's way to the kitchen window sill!  Looking for peanuts!.......
A Few Butterflies
Here is a variegated fritillary on lantana....
 
 
Next two pics are of The small snowberry clearwing moth. It's a day flying moth with almost no color scales on the wings. Have not seen the larger cousin, hummingbird clearwing, at home this summer. It is burgundy and gold~~~Redskin colors!.......

 Here's the very popular tiger swallowtail on butterfly bush....
 Taa Dah----here's a dimorphic female tiger! Means that the females can be either yellow or black. Since there are other black swallowtails, the trick on identifying them is the Bottom row of spots on the hindwing above the tails. The tiger has yellow spots! (like you're going to see that when they're flying!☺)....
This is a male spicebush swallowtail. Note the blue spots at bottom of wings. Males have aqua-blue colors....
 
The female spicebush has blue color patches as well as blue spots and the blue doesn't extend as high as the color on the male....
 





Saturday, August 17, 2013

Park Land Sightings

Chelsea Farm Property
This wonderful young fox ran towards my car instead of away!...

 That white tail tip confirms that he/she is a red fox. It turned off the road to go to the edge of the cornfield.... 

Surprise, surprise, first Spotty sighting and it's almost a pony!!...
 Fawn did some grazing until the Big Buckies appeared...
 About half a dozen boys come by frequently. Note that the one in center has only one antler.  He's on the right in the next picture...

 After awhile, a young deer with no antlers (maybe a doe) joined the group. A storm began and as the rain started, the small one jumped like a bucking bronco!  Most of them took shelter under a large holly tree...

Patuxent River Park
Not easy to see, but on this side of the butterfly bush in the garden, were about a dozen winged beauties......
Togetherness!?...
Last Saturday we heard LOTS of osprey chirping and assumed they were flying around. Seems this one was sitting in a walnut tree across from the Visitor Center....
Not a great video, but had to record those chirps! (you may have to turn up volume).... 
 
On the same day, we saw butterflies on the Joe Pye Weed....
Stopped at the creek valley by the eagle's nest and saw more tiger swallowtails sipping moisture and minerals.....

Big surprise outside of Park entrance----fawn and Mom just moved off the side of the road!....

Another BIG surprise---first monarch sighting in the garden!!! Hope a female will join him as we've had no monarch caterpillars feeding on the milkweed yet......


 
 


Wednesday, August 14, 2013

Houston Convention, 7-30-13

 Here's an unusual exhibit at a Clinical Chemistry Convention that my daughter, Sherry, attended. This bike was commissioned to be built by Paul Teutel, Jr! If you enlarge, you can see the DNA likeness on the front wheel....

Raffle is for TB research.....
 
Sherry with Paul, Jr......

Monday, July 1, 2013

Holiday Bird

Blackie, our eagle wannabe, stopped by the Park on Saturday! Enjoy....

Friday, June 28, 2013

New Family Members!!!

Today, Friday, 6-28-13, we saw for the first time, Ms. Turkey with the 5 Turklettes!!!.....
They are at the Chelsea farmhouse office. Before the big PM rain they were in shrubs at edge of pond. Later, they were close to the building and started running for cover when we opened a door!...

Friday, June 21, 2013

Not Too Wild Life!

In late May some Cedar Waxwings visited a service berry tree in front of the Park Visitor's Center...
 Finally, one clear pic out of 7!!...
 This black vulture likes to walk the road near the Park 
office, so we made him a sign.....
 Mountain Laurel along the Park road.....
 Honeysuckle, yum, the scent was nice...
 A neat little Nessus Sphinx moth I've never seen before in our blanket flower pot.....
 Young bucky boys at our neighbor's across the street! Too close to the road!!......
 A couple days later, we saw one right next to our back yard nibbling mulberries!!! We need another road sign!!....
 Ms. Chelsea turkey took a trot through the front yard the other day but didn't stop at the spa.....
 What kind of pictures do you get when playing car tag with little foxes through corn fields????....

Thursday, June 20, 2013

Growing Wrens and Geese!

House wrens started nestorations on May 2.  There was a gap in activity and we didn't know if anything was going to happen. After Mom started staying in the house we knew there had to be eggs. Then a hatch!!! Appetizers and meals came non stop by both parents.....

 We finally heard chirping inside and were able to see little heads...

Two beaks!!...
 
 On Friday AM, 6-14-13, the house was MT!!!!! And they hadn't even practiced coming out on the perch! Kind of sad~~we really enjoyed them.

The Chelsea Canada Geese
Including this pic again to show the size comparison...

 Oh boy!!   A swim.....
 It's harder for the camera to see, but the arrow shows a gosling's neck in the tall grass. Mom is nearest. All the juvies were in the field lopping off the tops of the plants!....
 "We're getting our uniforms!"....