A Slow Week for Birding

Although I don't actually go birdwatching like Stewart and David, I enjoy taking pictures of birds when I get a chance. Right now, my feeders are down except for the hummingbird feeder, and I haven't seen one yet, so I didn't get any bird photos in my backyard. The only one I took this week was this snapshot that I took while walking the dog.

I felt this post needed a more colorful picture, so I went back to my pictures from this time of year in 2020 and found this one of mallard ducks and a killdeer. 
 

Today the heat wave reached us. The temperature reached 97°F (36°), and it’s predicted to get even hotter. I did a small amount of yardwork before 10 AM, and by that time it was already getting uncomfortably warm and humid. Fortunately, my home has central air-conditioning, but even that is not as cool as it normally is. I’ve got the ceiling fan on. I just hope the power stays on and the AC doesn’t break down. 

Cool, Clear Water

The City Daily Photo theme for July 1 is "Water."

I set up a shot for the theme while I was watering roses. We’re looking at airborne drops of water that I sprayed from the hose. The evergreen trees in the background produced a Christmas tree look. I was hoping to form a rainbow, but I guess the sun was not at the right angle, although it was behind me as needed. I have created a small rainbow with a hose a few times in the past. It appears that some of the individual drops in this picture formed spots of color.

So far, our county is not under mandatory water restrictions. We’ve had a drought, but we received some rain over the past few days. Temperatures are going up very high tomorrow and are expected to stay that way until the weekend, when we may get some rain.

Dan, can you see that big, green tree?
Where the water's runnin' free
And it's waitin' there for you and me?
Water, cool, clear water?

(Lyrics by Bob Nolan, Recorded by Various Artists.)

I’ll close with a shot of the North Fork of the Shenandoah. 

Bright and Caloric

Front Royal, VA

This ice cream stand was closed, but their beach decor caught my eye. Moving closer, I saw flip-flops pictured along the top, and a tropical beach in the bottom mural, featuring a surfer, someone flying a kite, and people riding a bike.

Sharing the parking lot was a food truck serving Salvadoran and Mexican food. It looked appealing.

A car was parked nearby with an honest bumper sticker.

Bird Post #1318

Yes, there are 1,318 posts tagged Birds on this blog. In my early years of blogging, I didn’t make any particular effort to photograph birds, but took their pictures when they caught my attention. This scene with a great blue heron is from my first year of blogging, 2005.

The rest of today’s pictures are collages of selected bird photos from recent years. 

Late June with Charlie

Hi! Someone commented that I don’t smile much, but actually I do. Here is my sly smile.

Here is a cat design for Caturday. 

We had a couple days of rain this week. This picture was taken by the door camera, which is not on the doorframe because it fell down, so Mom put it on a shelf. Anyway, she took me out for the morning walk, and she started down the steps, but I saw it was raining so I stopped. I don't like getting wet. I refused to go out until the rain let up.

On another day, we had a different problem. We were going to go to the state park, but the roads were jammed with cars and trucks. There was a problem on the interstate, so the Valley Pike was full of vehicles and the side roads were very busy too. We went to Lowe’s instead, and I smelled the flowers and things in the garden center.

Yesterday we finally went to Seven Bends State Park after the rain let up. You might notice that I have a new vest. It’s just like my other summer vest, but it is purple like my new leash.

This week we saw rabbits in the neighborhood. I want to chase them, but Mom won’t let me.

Today I went to Sadie’s house. Here you see I’m talking to her, but she jumped up and tried to kiss me. I don’t want to be mean to her, but I wish she would stop.

People say I’m good looking, but that’s not always a good thing.

Running on Empty

Lately I've been so tired that I haven't done much exploring. Consequently, I couldn’t come up with a satisfying photo for Black and White Weekend. I wound up with this shadow shot, turning it and cropping so there’s a diagonal to add a sense of movement.

This was just a snapshot I took to illustrate my complaint that the deck was too hot for bare feet. The planks are newly painted, and the sun was very bright that day. 

Doctors haven’t been too helpful in explaining my fatigue, but tests continue to show that my protein and sodium levels are low. I’m supposed to take sodium pills, but they upset my stomach, So I’ve tried to increase my dietary salt, plus sodium bicarbonate in place of Tums. 

I still go to physical therapy to try to improve steadiness and strength, but it leaves me exhausted for a day or two. I keep trying because I really want to be able to walk farther. 

River Access, Headley Road

East of Maurertown

When I was writing Sunday’s post, I did online research to confirm the location of my pictures and saw that there’s a boat landing near there that I had not seen yet. On Monday it rained, but finally it let up and I put Charlie in the car and drove back to Maurertown and went out Zion Church Road to find the place. It was right where the DWR website said it was: on Headley Road just after you turn off Zion Church Road and cross the North Fork. 

The rain had returned as a light drizzle, but that didn’t stop us from getting out of the car. I wanted to take some pictures and Charlie wanted to take a walk.

No one else was there. Parking is restricted, but I have a fishing license from DWR. I don’t fish, but there are places where I need a license in order to park, so I invested in one. These parking lots are small, and paid for by license fees.

Soon we got back in the car. There was one more site. I wanted to see nearby. It’s Hudgin’s Rest. and you can’t really see it from the road in summer, but I photographed the sign. 

The rain made everything extra green.

Blue and Crested

Cyanocitta cristata

The blue jay can be seen across much of  North America. It’s a familiar backyard bird here in Virginia.

When I took its picture high in a tree, I did not recognize the bird because my eyesight is not that sharp, especially with sunglasses on. Looking at the cropped photo later, I could clearly see the markings around its head.

The second photo is from over a month ago and was taken automatically by the feeder camera. Since then, all my feeders have come down because the deck was repainted. The birds don’t need to be fed in the summer anyway. 

This bird looks a little different and may be a juvenile.

The final picture is an earlier one that I took with my Nikon.

Summertime Collages

The first image shows recent flower photos plus a border. The other images are from past summers.

Mosaic Linkup / Garden Affair

Tree Mural Redone in Luray

It’s been a while since I drove through a particular parking lot in Luray, so when I saw that the tree mural had been replaced, I stopped to take a picture.

I posted a photo of the old mural way back in December 2014. There wasn’t as much foliage then, but it was winter, after all. Here’s a screen shot of that post.

It looks like I’ve been linking to Monday Murals since late summer of 2014. At that time it was hosted by Oakland Daily Photo. Sometimes I think I’m running out of murals to share, but then I see something like this one. Outdoor paintings don’t last forever.