Thursday, August 21, 2008

NC Birds

I suppose that mid-August is not the best time for birding. The nesting season is over and migration is barely begun. In North Carolina, the most populous birds were Goldfinches and Blue Jays, followed by Black Vultures. This lovely Bluebird sang sweetly from a crab apple tree on a clear morning. I kept expecting to see soaring hawks, but not one appeared.
This Hummingbird dove as deeply as possible into a trumpeter flower. The rhododendron jungle along Bent Creek at the North Carolina Arboretum hid the Carolina Chickadees and Tufted Titmice that scolded us along the trail. You can't find them either, can you? A Chipping Sparrow celebrated the seed he found along the sidewalk. On Lake Lure we found two Great Blue Herons, two Green Herons and a vocal Kingfisher, along with a family of Canadian Geese. As the sun went down, a Turkey flock (called a rafter-- never heard that one before.) came out for dinner on the golf course. There must have been 10 0r 12 of them, including this year's young. We used the flash on this shot, trying to see anything at all. I call this the vampire turkey - look at his eye!

1 comment:

Bob Lenning said...

I'll be darned. I didn't know that they called a flock of turkeys a rafter. My Random House Webster's agrees with you and points out that raft is an informal term for a lot of something. My favorite has always been a murder of crows, though a charm of goldfinches has a nice ring too!