Western Meadowlark

Overnight, winter returned here and the steadily falling snow looks like it is here to stay. Two days ago, it was a glorious spring day, with temperatures up to 13C.

This was a very lucky shot, taken rapidly through the car window, just in time before the bird disappeared out of sight behind the front of the car. It had been a long time since I had seen a Western Meadowlark, so I was thrilled to bits when I spotted this one, feeding in the dried grasses along the side of the gravel backroad. I had to crop the photo from the left, as the bird's bill was this close to the right hand edge of the shot. Almost missed it, ha.

The photo was taken two days ago, on 14 April 2014, when I spent a wonderful, fun day with my youngest daughter, driving the backroads SE of Calgary. Some of the roads were familiar to me, but others were new territory, which gave us a chance to discover some different abandoned barns. We knew where our destination was going to be, more or less, though it was disappointing that the "heat wave" distortion was just too great to get distant, zoomed photos. Unfortunately, it was quite a hazy day, which really didn't help. Once we got quite close, the problem thankfully went away.

Our drive was not to see one kind of thing only. Both of us love to photograph anything beautiful or interesting. Naturally, birds were on our wish list, too, and we were lucky to come across several different species, including this beautiful Western Meadowlark. The very first place I drove to, was to see a Great Horned Owl nest. Those who know me won't be at all surprised to hear that I couldn't find the nest that I had intended going to, lol! I was so confident driving to where I "knew" it would be, yet there was no sign of it. Next time I go back to that area, I will have to have a longer look. However, we were so happy to see the nest we did find. There were two very young ones in it, snuggled up to Mom (photo also posted today). Other birds seen included a Red-tailed Hawk, Northern Shovelers, Pintail ducks, and lots of elegant Swans which looked so beautiful in the sunshine with the distant Rocky Mountains in the background.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_Meadowlark

www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/western_meadowlark/id

flic.kr/p/naUfAS