Travels…

As you might be aware, it’s been some time since I posted to my blog… and with good reason.  In mid-April I traveled to Arizona for about ten days and then made a quick turnaround and went to Texas for about a week.  Both of these were birding trips so the good news is that I now have a vastly increased inventory of Southwestern bird images for the blog.  The bad news is that I now must process those images.  I have 985 images from the AZ trip and 1435 from the TX trip.  You will never see the majority of those images but I must sort through ALL of them!

To add to my workload, it’s time for spring arrivals here at the house.  My wife tells me that warblers have already started arriving and the grosbeaks should be close behind.  That means I will be drawn to the yard for more photography.  Depending on what shows up, I may be tempted to insert some current photos before I complete processing photos from my travels.    If you are interested in birding and live in the Anacortes area you are always welcome to join me in the yard for observation or photography with advance notice.

But let’s get on with the show and commentary.  These first few photos were taken at a motel in Green Valley, AZ.  (If you are an environmentalist you might be interested in researching the city on the internet… and don’t be tempted to move there like more than one of our PacNW friends!)

This first photo is of a Cactus wren, seemingly very common throughout AZ.  (I just had a thought that this might be the State Bird of AZ so I inquired on the internet and found I was right!)  In later posts you will probably see several photos of Cactus wrens in or near their nests.  This one seemed to be eating ants in the gravel.

A White-winged dove sitting on an Ocotillo bloom.  We found Ocotillo seemingly at the peak of their bloom throughout the state.

And another visitor to an Ocotillo bush, this a House finch eating blossoms.  By happenstance I happened to catch this finch just as it dropped a part of the blossom.

Stay tuned for more AZ photos!