Sunday Constitutional

Today's walk photos concentrate on Gooseneck Cove and the salt marsh at Hazard Rd. Mama Gaia has had her paint brush out and has begun to decorate the Cove for Autumn.

And of course there were birds. The first I saw was this immature Double-crested Cormorant, who let me get within 5 feet of it. It was nervous at first and shuffled its feet, but settled down when I made no threatening moves. After a while it actually started making "feed me Mommy!" moves, spreading its wings a little, shuffling its feet, and opening its beak. Obviously I had no fish to give it. When I saw some Mullet break the surface a little later I pointed and said, "There's food, dummy. Go get it!" Believe it or not, it looked where I was pointing, walked off the rock into the water, and swam in the general direction and dove. You just never know!






















There were a lot of Egrets around. On the flats to the east of the road I counted 12 Great Egrets and 5 Snowy Egrets. Here are two shots - the top one a group shot of a bunch together, and the bottom a shot of a single bird to emphasize the salt marsh's first blush of Fall color.

But the coup of the day was the fact that I was able to get some decent shots of one of the Belted Kingfishers who hang out at the Cove. There were two there today, a male and a female, but it's the female who tends to hang around the area of Hazard Rd.; the male tends to hang out down around where the dam used to be up from the Green Bridge on Ocean Drive. I got two usable shots of the female on both of her preferred perches - on the Osprey platform on the flats and on a wooden split rail fence down at the bottom end of the flats. I've been trying for years to get a decent shot of these people-shy birds who never sit still. Success at last!

And that's my Sunday constitutional!

© 2010 by A. Roy Hilbinger