More Birds

When we returned from our morning walk, Ken noticed that the migrating birds were back, only this time they were strung out sitting on the water. We walked down to the shore, which was not as easy as before. The rain last night left everything muddy, and the mud accumulated on our shoes. We braved the mud to try to get some photos of the flock. Using the highest zoom on the PowerShot SX110IS, we got some fuzzy shots, but clear enough to identify at least some of the birds.

A heron happened to be fishing along the shore as a bonus. The white birds appear to be American White Pelicans and the smaller dark birds are Double Crested Cormorants. The size of the flocks we have seen is quite amazing.

This flock was strung out for a long way. After a while, individual birds started flying towards the front of the line and then landing. Perhaps they felt safer staying with the group. More and more birds did this, looking kind of like a relay, until finally the whole flock was in flight and disappeared from sight.

We watched this morning as the groups of Indian Princesses and their dads packed up to leave. One dad I talked to said that his daughter still had plenty of energy, but he was pretty tired! By this afternoon, we were all alone on our loop again. Peace and quiet have returned and are welcome, but we enjoyed the entertainment of watching all the activity and the tribal displays of carved pumpkins.