Being a hobbyist photographer has given a discipline and consistency to my adventures in nature. And being in my second year of this relationship it has gifted me a great pleasure in seeing the rhythms, events, blooms, colors, animals, weather, and seasonal events as they roll around in their sometimes distinct and recognizable annual forms.
No recurring event I have seen has been as delightful as what, for the second time, happened today. It ever falls on a day in Autumn, beautiful and clear and with most of the leaves off the trees, and consists mainly of all the wee burdies flocking together in great masses down at my creek and going crazy. My best guess is that there is a feeding event, some proliferating insect or seed. But whatever it is, my little pocket of woods fills with birds, mostly in the form of robins, maybe thousands of robins. But other birds come by as well, thrushes and cardinals, and this year especially, a whole vast assortment of woodpeckers.
The best thing is that all these birds, so wild with their bird party and their feasting, no longer shy away from me on this special day. Instead they swirl about me. They embrace me. They let me come close to them as they frolic in the stream and dart among the ragged leaves. Their wings brush my shoulders as they fly about.
It makes me feel like a Disney Princess!
On this extended walk I took over 300 pictures. You will find none of them here today because they still require a great deal of editing. I did briefly catch a glimpse of the first draft of these photos and I don't have the highest level of confidence in them. The birds were feisty, and moved around a lot. And I'm only so good of a picture taker.
I'm pretty sure I got some good shots of some riffles in the stream though.
But though I may be disappointed to find that none of my eighty pictures of a giant red headed woodpecker I got within ten feet of turned out well, I understand that's not really the main thing.
Picture or no picture, I was there. I made bird friends. And it was wonderful.
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