The Excitement Never Ends

Red-breasted Merganser

So yesterday we went back down to the river, and although we didn't see the Black-bellied Plover again, we did meet two expert birders, with whom I was delighted to chat a bit. (Met one of them last spring in the same spot...so nice to encounter him again and to meet his friend .)

They identified a little flock of small shorebirds that kept whirling past us as Dunlin, which are new for me in the county, although I have seen them before at Montezuma.

A little better photo of the scoters....but only a little

They went down to Yankee Hill with us too, and confirmed that the birds there were indeed Surf Scoters, as they were still hanging around.

It spit and spat and sputtered rain all day today, so I did a short walk around the house and called it good until late this afternoon.

Then we went back down to Schoharie Crossing, as it had stopped raining for a bit.

It was COLD (!!!) down there and the wind was roaring, so I bent over to zip my hoodie.

There, right at my feet, right at the edge of the water, was a merganser. I have been looking, both here and at Montezuma, for a Red-breasted Merganser for at least a year. I have seen dozens of Common Mergs and find them delightful....but I wanted the rarer one.

And guess what..... 

Red-breasted Merganser

The Things you See

Cheap Date

Greater Yellowlegs

I am. Point me at the outdoors and hand me my binoculars. We ran down to the river today to celebrate getting the taxes paid. (Thanks for all the help....you know who you are).

We saw the most amazing birds! Yankee Hill Lock and Schoharie Crossing SHS at the boat launch are exciting places for good birds. We saw Pectoral Sandpipers a week or so ago at the latter but today, just wow.

Black-bellied Plover

First we spotted a little white sandpiper-ish thing hanging around with some Yellowlegs. I thought (and hoped) it was a Black-bellied Plover and the experts agreed. 

Then when we came home I looked at some photos of the Yellowlegs, which I had thought were all Greaters, and thought we had a Lesser. Experts agreed.

Lesser Yellowlegs

Next came some odd little black ducks at Yankee Hill Lock. Folks have been seeing Surf Scoters up in Saratoga Lake for the past week or so and I really wanted to see some over here...just one county away...but I didn't expect to. 

These birds were all the way across the river, the light was poor, and they were almost the color of the water. Couldn't see them at all without the binoculars; I had to photograph them by finding landmarks nearby and taking photos of those....just hoping the birds were in the frame.

Hopefully Surf Scoters (in front of the Canadas)

After much discussion the good folks at What's this Bird mostly agreed that we had indeed found Surf Scoters, lifers for me, and rare birds here, according to eBird. There is still some discussion that they may be White-winged Scoters as some were seen here about five days ago. Whichever, they were pretty cool. Guess we will see what the eBird reviewer thinks. 

What a tremendous amount of fun we had, what with worrying about taxes off our minds. The best part from my point of view was that I got them right...or kinda sorta right...or I at least had the right answers among the birds I was considering, and hoping against hope that my wildest guesses were the correct ones.

What a day!

Tax Time

Nuff said

Caution Sick Fox

This man would have practically stepped on the fox
if the boss hadn't yelled to him

We took a quick spin down to the boat launch at Schoharie Crossing, despite the rotten weather, in order to do a quick bird list. Kinda nasty to be walking at home. 

It may have been a good thing we did. While I was going nuts over a flock of American Pipits, the boss was exclaiming, "There's something in the road!"

Even without the binoculars we could see that it was a fox and not in a normal pose. Through the bins it looked downright awful! 

It was hunched in the road not moving, while a walker approached it from behind a small hill where he couldn't see that it was there.

The boss jumped out of the car and hollered to him. After about three yells the fox finally staggered off the road. The man was grateful to have been warned.

We have been getting notices from our veterinarian on Facebook about rabies in the area and I suspect that this may be a case of that.

We stopped at the sheriff's office to report it and came on home.

We are always cautious about wildlife, but I guess even more vigilance is in order now. 

Watch out if you use the boat launch!

Running Against the Wind

So far we have seen a shocking amount of rain, but whatever wind there was wasn't bad enough to wake me up. The dog buckets were full this morning though, and yesterday I noticed that they needed filling. I did not participate in the filling this time.

Now my phone is getting all excited with alerts about road closures and flood warnings, and the gust are getting kind of noticeable so I guess I had better bring the puppers in.

Dang. I wanted to get at least a thousand words written before I went on daytime duty.

Ah, well, welcome to morning. 

Pennants

October's flying her last flags;  she won't surrender to November. 

Walk the wild side, 

Walk it now. Get her before she leaves us;

We went out west again yesterday to visit, and bird, and so Becky could shop. The colors were fine as frog's hair, all purple, puce, and magenta.....plus every single shade of brown and gold that the good Lord chose to send us. 

Oaks of every shape and sort were clinging to their leaves like oak trees always do. 

I think they're bashful. 

Maples, sumacs, the tender deciduous trees, they just let it all hang out.

Toss their leaves on the closet floor, race away naked, rustle, rustle, rustle.

Oaks hug their wrappers tight around them, like grannies wearing curlers, clutching flannel to their breasts, as if to ward off peepers.

Peeping Toms that we are, we delighted in the colors, and a good thing too, as at least hereabouts the woods are getting awful bare.

All too soon comes the penance of November, payback for every inch of summer.

I was grateful today for one last wild walk....well, maybe not the last, but the end of these passable days is coming soon....before the white stuff flies and ice and hunters keep me near the house.

Endangered Species Flack

I ain't afraid of no ghost

Please, please, read this story. 

"Since the Dusky Gopher Frog is nowhere to be found on the land in question, designating a big slice of it as “unoccupied critical habit” is an oxymoron. You might as well say the moon is unoccupied critical habitat of Casper the Ghost Frog. This goes too far."

Don't get me wrong, I have always loved frogs, but this is nuts.

Dawn Ponies

Good natured little Diamond, such a sweet, kind pony.

The eastern sky looks like a blood orange just now..... dawn is nearly coming.

It's still dark in the barn though.

How do you hold a flashlight and serve up slabs of hay I wonder....I stick it in my pocket and fumble around for the dull knife that hangs there to cut twine......I have a super sharp Swiss Army knife in the house. I carry it always. Why am I fighting with this thing? Feeding horses in my bathrobe, that's why.

The ponies are just blobs of grey in the gloom.

It doesn't matter; they are as predictable as sunrise, if not as bright in color.

Jack has his head through the gate, nickering and shuffling his little black hooves. He is the quintessential pony, full of fuss and bother. "Me first, me first, me first..." 

And so I feed him first, nearest the door and just plain easier. And quieter.

Diamond stands broadside to her door, calm and serious, and so very gentle, the nicest mare I have ever worked around, just waiting for me to toss her hay in the corner. 

And then Gambit. He is tiny, so he puts his front hooves on the bottom rim of his stall door, the better to roll his big white eye at me and pinch his dainty nostrils, threatening grievous bodily harm if I don't hurry up with that blasted hay.

Hah, I'm not fooled. He is so darned friendly he wants to be petted every single morning before he turns around to eat. And so I pet him.

I like feeding the ponies. Heck, I just like ponies. 

And that's all.

Corn Henge

And BIG tillage tools

One Day at a Time

No fear at 11 months...much braver than in later years

After a great weekend and weeks of incredible weather, the season is sliding down into winter. Yesterday was a weirdly warm rainy one, a lot of water came down. Every time I tried to go out and walk the rain would intensify and I would be chased indoors.

Good thing I have my grandmother's cedar chest to keep me entertained. Mom gave it to me for my birthday this year and during the busy days of summer I neglected poking through it. It is still full of things that grandma saved, old birthday cards, bills, newspaper clippings and such. Photos. Lots and lots of photos.

I have done a little spelunking in there over the past few days and found all sorts of treasures. A photo of me on a pony at eleven months old, grinning like a Jack 'o Lantern. Guess I liked horses right from the start.

Photos of grandma and grandpa's dog, Nikki. I was so fond of him...

The stairs in their old house where we used to sit on the landing upstairs and "fish" down into the kitchen with strings. We only caught passing grownups who obliged by tugging our string "fishing lines" but we were easy to entertain in those days.

The leaning garage held up by its contents, or so we used to joke back in the day. When your grandparents lived through the Great Depression they don't throw things away.

My mama and daddy's wedding photo, looking so fine and happy.

And much, much more.

Kinda brightens up these gloomy days.

I need to go through the photos again and sort them out for different cousins and brothers and all. Too much treasure for just me to hoard.

And 29 years later, 30 years old, at grandma's 75th birthday party. I sure loved those two.

May I Help Who's Next?

I spent this past Saturday, helping (to the best of my meager ability), these two hard-working young folks, at Amber's family's Homemade Frozen Custard Shop at the Windmill in Penn Yan. 

You should have seen them go! It made me tired just watching them, as they waited on customers, twirled cones, and built sundaes. Meanwhile, I fried what needed frying after kinda/sorta learning to run the fryer.

It was an interesting day and I had a lot of fun. The Windmill is an incredibly cool place with so many tempting products and lots and lots of produce for sale. You could do your Christmas shopping all in one stop, while filling the pantry and freezer with goodies, and having more tasty things to eat than you could imagine.....just ask me about the Spud Boat.

We did a whirlwind tour in the morning before the crowds arrived and I can't wait to go back, although that will probably have to wait until next summer.

However, if you are out that way next Saturday, the location's last open day for the year, do stop in and look around. The kiddies will be dressed up for Halloween and I can personally recommend the ice cream. Admission is free, parking ditto, and with around 200 vendors there is so much to see you won't know which way to turn.

Do not miss this booth,
best homemade ice cream and chicken and all sorts of other stuff in town.
(Hey Bath peeps do you see what I did here with the pumpkin, as I didn't have photo permission for the guy at the window? LOL)

Eccentric

Another zealous apple picker

Good thing it's dark at 5:30 in the morning or they might come for me with a net.

Because I was out in the driveway with a flashlight at that hour this morning, using my doggie-kennel-super-duper-scooper to roll apples down the hill.

It took quite a while. 

And why, you may ask, was I rolling apples down the hill?

Well, that old Winesap of Grandma Peggy's, which sometimes I think of as being more of a Whinesap...or maybe I'm the sap and also whiny....had a bumper crop of apples this summer.

Quite literally. It stands next to the walkway to the dogs' runs, the wood stove, the pony and horse yards, and several gardens. 

And it is a menace. Guess it got Liz once and I've had a couple of near misses. The apples fall so hard they split every time. Whack! Whap! Crack! That'll wake you up...

Then yesterday afternoon when I was walking Mack up for his afternoon constitutional, he screamed and began racing around on three legs, frantically looking at his nether regions. It took a lot of petting and cuddling to calm him down.

Alas, horses are not the only ones that like apples. The Yellow Jackets and assorted other stinging nuisances love them too. 

Poor Mack. Being a Jack Russell Terrier, he was soon running around as if nothing had happened, but he sat down in a very dainty manner the rest of the day.

You can't rake wasp infested apples in daylight so.....

Call me eccentric, but don't call the authorities. This all makes sense when you're me. Thanks.

Drama on the High Seas

Snidely Whiplash

Or the tranquil river, as the case may be.

We had fifteen minutes to burn before picking up Becky at work, so we went down to the Schoharie Crossing SHS boat launch to look around. I walked off by myself a ways and saw a thing sleeping on the riverbank.

It was about the size of a Mallard, but it just....wasn't.....

If I didn't know better I'd have sworn that it was a Brant. 

Nell...AKA Branta bernicla

While not exactly rare, spotting a Brant is only a sometimes experience. I took a lot of pictures of the bankside lump and looked around some more....ooh, two sandpipers. I thought they were Greater Yellowlegs, although they were far away and didn't look or act quite right. (I was delighted later to discover that I was wrong.)

 

I snapped pics of them and went back to the boss. Fifteen minutes and all you know.

Suddenly from the east came a Bald Eagle sailing low over the trees.

He spotted the lump.

Snidely attempting to invite Sweet Nell to dinner...his dinner....

And wham, down he came. Up went the sandpipers, but the Brant just swam, right up in front of us.

It was something to see. The eagle strafed the water, the little goose dove and dodged. The sandpipers were long gone.

Eventually the eagle gave up and sailed away. The goose just kept on swimming.

Even the boss was excited and told some fellows who stopped at the next picnic table for lunch all about it.

And the second best part of it....the sandpipers turned out to be Pectorals, lifers for me and new for my county list. 

What a great 18 minutes...yeah, we stayed a little longer than we planned. Becky didn't mind a bit.

Curses, foiled again!