Sunday, August 26, 2018

BIRD WATCHING SEASON STARTS AGAIN

      I lead a local bird watching group. What it means is that I make up a schedule, publicize it and show up to take people around. I usually have a good idea what birds we might see in an area and then the challenge is to find the little critters. 

      I have about 25 people who attend some of the sessions. I get from 10 - 15 each time. I also have some very avid birders and some who are highly skilled. 

     Most of the sites we visit are in the city. They tend to be parks with some good native habitat. We spend about 2 hours at each site. 

    Last spring we were getting very good and would find 20 - 30 species in the two hours.

    Yesterday was the start of our fall bird watching schedule. We went to an area we had never visited. This summer someone told me of a new bike trail. The trail is made up of an old road allowance and part of it has been destroyed. Some artificial wetlands have been created. Houses are built up to the old road and the other side of the road is country. I thought this would be a good place for one of our birding outings. When I was riding birds kept flying up out of the grass.  Most nights I would see a merlin. There were geese and riding through goose poop wasn't a lot of fun.

    So did we have a good time yesterday morning ? You bet we did. The area is junky as it's being developed . Along with the trees and grass there's a good supply of weeds.

     We were happy to find 15 species of birds. It was dull and hard to see. Many of the species were sparrows and they are hard to see in the best of light.

     I've been complaining all summer about my glasses being filmy. I say it's better without my glasses. The Micro manager says I have to wash my glasses. Yesterday it was hard to get a good look at the birds. I wasn't seeing much color. Things were dull. Somebody said get new binoculars with better light.

    I've thought things over. It sounds like my cataracts have changed this summer. I will have to get in and get things checked.

     My apologies for no photos. I don't like carrying both the camera and binoculars.