Hello from Sunday night

Hello from Sunday night guys and hello from the beautiful Reifel bird sanctuary.

I’m so happy that on this beautiful, sunny spring day, I had a chance to drive out to and walk around the Reifel bird sanctuary.

I love it here.
I do.

Today, being a sunny and warm Sunday, the parking lot was completely full.

Loads of people were walking the paths, including a ton of children.

I did have to remind a family, whose 10-ish yr old boy was whacking the bushes along the path, that this is a protected sanctuary.

The family was suitably embarrassed and told the boy to knock it off. The boy said, “but I don’t like just walking!”

I’m so frustrated. Why the hell do people take their wayward children to a bird sanctuary?
Why the hell don’t people raise their children properly in the first place!

Oh don’t get me started.

Happily, my own children respect nature and all living things. So we can start with my three and carry on with our four grandchildren and hopefully, all of yours as well. Now we’re getting somewhere.

It seemed that everyone was in full spring fever chirping and twittering away like mad.

I did find some really large egg shells. I wondered who they belonged to. The Canada geese maybe? The Sandhill cranes? They must have been big eggs. I didn’t see any goslings around yet.

I wanted to find the resident Sandhill cranes and spied one out on an island in the middle of one of the waterways.
Apparently that is the new nesting site.

And then, suddenly overhead, a racket, as two more cranes came in for a landing on the path.

They joined a third and all raised their beaks to the sky and whooped with joy!

And then started to preen themselves and eat the bird seed offered as though nothing happened.

I stood for quite a long time at a section of the path known for blackbird with my outstretched hand offering black sunflower seeds in hopes that one might land on my hand, but no good. It was too late in the afternoon and they were already full up from earlier feedings, rolling around the bushes like fat little porkers barely able to stuff another seed into their little bellies. It’s a wonder they could fly! 😀

But I did have the most wonderful day, and in the end of my walk, I stopped by the entrance shop and bought a second-hand bird book with the most amazing photographs. It might help me in my quest to be a better artist and learn to paint my birds in better poses.

Hope you all had a brilliant weekend and hope your new week proves to be rich in love, fun and loads of good energy. 😀