Birds

Red-winged Blackbird

| edwinridout

Was he expecting to find spring in Virginia?
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We’ve seen them regularly at the pond at the other end of Harwill Drive, but not in the winter, and never at home at all until this snowstorm when two of them came to our feeders. Only the male is the distinctive black with epaulets. Cornell Lab of Ornithology says “Females are a subdued, streaky brown, almost like a large, dark sparrow.”

Common Grackle

| edwinridout

We had a couple of common grackles at our feeders during this snowstorm, but I wasn’t quick enough with the camera. We’ve never had them at home before. They were big, black, with a very dark blue head, and their eyes were yellow.

Snow day

| edwinridout

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Through the kitchen window at lunchtime during the snowstorm which closed schools at least three days. We only got three inches (Elspeth and Tim got six) followed by unusually low temperatures for the rest of the week. An opportunity to snap both the male and female cardinals at once — my Kodak Easyshare, hand-held, on maximum optical zoom.

Great blue heron

| edwinridout


At Government Island, Stafford, Virginia. 2:54pm, Kodak Easyshare, maximum zoom, no tripod. Got another chance at the same bird a few minutes later, 3:06pm, from a different angle and a bit closer.

How can the same bird look so different from a different angle and with light that must have been almost the same? And that is the same water, not snow, even the same spot. The temperature was about 60F, or 16C. I was in a T-shirt on the last Sunday in November.