Another birding trip

Not a terribly good birding trip, especially since I actually worked to get out of the house before sunrise.  No eagles.  No good hawks.  So you just take what you can get.

They were a good ways off, but you couldn't mistake their loud honking, The Sandhill Cranes are back in town.  I would love to find them when they are doing their mating dances.

Like on Noah's Ark, all the birds are arriving two-by-two.  The geese are wonderfully easy to photograph when they sit still.

My challenge is when they take off or land.  I love the look when they run along the water before getting enough speed to take off.  I just never seem to have the camera set to a fast enough shutter speed to really freeze the action and of course, there is just no time to react.

Same with this one.  1/500th of a second is just too slow.  I need a new technique.

Ever heard the expression "water off a duck's back"?   They must have been talking about Coots.  They seem to be the most waterproof birds I see.  There are always beads of water on their feathers.

If you saw my napping horses, you know the value of a sunny nap on a spring day.  Ever the ducks are feeling it.

And for a lack of interesting animal life, I tried some more artsy photos.  There is an entire art to converting color photos to black and white, using differences in the color channels to add contrast and texture.  I have much to learn.

And a weed with a pretty backdrop, although it would have been nicer without all the smog.