Christmas Vacation Nature Walk

Nature walks get a post all to themselves.=)

Over Christmas break, Glen's dad, Andrew and I got up to enjoy a much needed and missed nature walk.  I'd never been to this park (Converse North Park) but the website said great for birding and hiking so we tried it out.  At first glance, no trail.  Huh?  I'm glad dad was there because he pointed out the tons of wilderness to trek through and we saw some fun new stuff.

Cattails.  I've seen them but don't know if I've ever touched one and certainly never knew it was similar to a dandelion once it started falling apart.  It was such a fun mess.

Fun feathery grass.

We overturned some rocks and logs with mostly no luck.  But this rock had a good size camoflauge spider.  It's at the end of the stick.  

Gotta have fun climbing on stuff.  Boy we need to get out more.

This bird might be hard to see.  See that white thing in the middle of this picture.  It's a snowy egret.  Good size and gorgeous bird.

The best sighting of the day was a great horned owl.  We were lucky to find out what he was because at first we just saw a bird with an enormous wing span flying away.  We started walking in the direction he flew and thought we'd lost him.  About a half hour later, we spotted him flying away again but this time we were able to follow without spooking him.  I wish we could've gotten a picture but there was no way he would let us get that close.  I was thankful for those binoculars.  It was amazing to see his huge yellow eyes and pointed ears.  He reminded me of Owl from Winnie the Pooh.  He was HUGE!!!  

  

I used to think birdwatching would be a boring hobby.  It's just another bird right!  I'm still not a gung-ho birdwatcher.  Still need to get a birding book cuz I don't know half of the stuff I see.  But I'm amazed at how much more noticeable just the sounds of birds have become to me.  I LOVE it.  In our backyard, I could tell you if it's our bluejay or our cardinal that's nearby.  Leaving a primary meeting I heard a bird chirping at us as we're getting into our car.  I didn't even realize I was looking for the bird until Sally asked about it.  He was so cute.  Then on the way home, we spotted 2 woodpeckers with red heads and the long pointed beak.  They were so cute and let us watch them peck the tree and the ground for a few mins.  I think we're going to have to get back into these nature walks.  No more excuses.