A Surprise at Wilkins Lake

Our tax refund check arrived this week and I volunteered to deposit it in the bank. I need to go to the supermarket in Stephens City and the bank in Winchester is not much farther. Since it was a nice day, I planned to eat a snack in the car and take a few pictures at Wilkins Lake.

There were multiple families of Canada geese with goslings. I grabbed my keys and my camera and hopped out of the car.  I already had an "infinity scarf" on that I could use as a mask if I needed to briefly speak to someone.

I noticed a woman taking pictures by the pond and spied her subject: a great blue heron.

He was posed so perfectly that I thought it might be a statue. No, it moved. I crossed the bridge quietly to get a better picture.

The heron was accustomed to being around people. Unlike the herons that visit my neighborhood, he let people get within five yards or so before he moved away.

One man with a little boy said, "Look, he's as big as you are!"

Everyone moved to the far side of the path, giving the bird some social distance. The heron seemed fine with that.

Dogs, however, were a different story. A couple walking a dog got within fifty feet and the heron jumped in the water. They detoured and he flapped his big wings and came back out. 

That's when I decided to use the motor drive feature on my camera. Once I set it, each click of the shutter takes three or four pictures in rapid succession. The result is a lot of almost identical pictures to sort later. The advantage is that if the bird dives or flies, I get several pictures of the action, greatly increasing the chance of getting a good one.

The screen shot shows two rows of frames in Adobe Bridge. I always mark my pictures with stars as I preview them. One star means I like it, two means I'll probably use it, three means I used it in a collage or somewhere other than my blog, and four means I printed it and posted it. I save the five star designation for something special.

The heron was fishing. He sees something!

In he went! Doesn't he look happy on his way back out?

Then he spread his wings and showed off his dinosaur heritage! "I am pterodactyl!"

I love this guy!

Saturday's Critters / I'd Rather Be Birdin'