Anne Elliott's photos with the keyword: painting

This photo is mainly just as a record that I actually got out on a birding walk with a group of friends two mornings ago. I thought it was a nice idea that someone had painted this rock and placed it in an old tree stump. One look at the weather forecast for this week and I decided that, if I was going to head over to Carburn Park, I had better do it (two mornings ago). The temperature was a balmy PLUS 1C-3C! Today, 10 January 2018, it is snowing again and the temperature is -22C (windchill -31C). Crazy weather. Just noticed that tomorrow morning is supposed to be -29C (windchill -37C). The light was not good for photos on this walk and most of the birds were very distant, as usual, at this location. Funny how it always works - if one is walking along the edge of the river, the birds are mainly on the far side. We did see 29 bird species, though. Later in the day, a friend very kindly picked me up and we went to the meeting about the recent Christmas Bird Counts. What an enormous amount of detail and facts are collected each year - most impressive and valuable!

I photographed this square mural in Blackie, Alberta, during a recent birding trip to the Frank Lake area, on 19 March 2016. Blackie is a hamlet approximately 70 km SE of Calgary. I looked on Google, but was unable to find any details about this cowboy mural. Just off the left edge of the photo stands the large, metal Cargill grain terminal. Not exactly the most beautiful of structures, but still rather impressive, and definitely not as photogenic as the three old, wooden elevators that apparently used to be along the railway line, just a very short distance away. In 2004, Blackie apparently had 3 elevators, an Ex-Agricore, Pioneer and Agricore United steel elevator. The large, green, wooden elevator was torn down in 2005 and replaced by this huge, modern grain loading terminal. The other wooden elevator, the Pioneer elevator, was torn down in December 2012. It was a fairly modern, seemingly well-kept elevator. Wish I had seen these, but I hadn't plucked up courage to drive SE of Calgary back then. "There were 1,651 elevators in Alberta in 1951, but by 1982 a total of 979 elevators remained. The 1990s spelled the death of the wooden “country” or “primary” elevator. At the end of the 1990s, as the full impact of both of the ending of the Crow Rate in 1995 and further impending rail abandonment was felt, the pace of demolition accelerated at an unprecedented rate. At the end of the 1996-1997 crop year, there were only 327 elevators left. Alberta’s largest cooperative grain companies, the Alberta Wheat Pool (which amalgamated with Manitoba Pool Elevators in 1998 as Agricore) and United Grain Growers, ultimately formed a new corporate entity known as Agricore United in 2001, issuing issued public shares. Demolition of country elevators has continued, and in 2005 there were only 156 wooden elevators of any kind still standing, only a handful of which are used by the grain trade. The Government of Alberta has recognised the significance of the traditional wood grain elevators, and has designated 12 as Provincial Historic Resources. They are located in the following communities: Andrew, Castor, Leduc, Meeting Creek, Paradise Valley, Radway, Rowley (3 elevators), Scandia and St. Albert (2 elevators)." www.grainelevatorsalberta.ca/articles/HRM-history.pdf www.bigdoer.com/2848/exploring-history/grain-elevators-an... I will add our leader's report of the day that he sent into eBird, adding that I did not see all of the sightings, as the birds were much too far away. As always, my camera lens was turned to various other things, too. Thanks so much, as always, Andrew, for a most enjoyable day! Thanks, too, Anne, for driving - I really appreciated the ride! "We had 16 participants when we left Calgary on a sunny but frosty morning. We arrived at the main gate around 10:00 am and set off, in a chilly -5 deg C to walk down to the outfall and then around to the blind. The recent cold nights had refrozen some of the lake, but it is still mostly open water. Most obvious were the thousands of Pintails and hundreds of swans (mostly Tundra today). We did see the overwintering (presumably) Song Sparrow near the outfall. About 60-80 California Gulls, no other gulls that we could identify. We left and went to High River for lunch, stopping by the Sutherland Shelterbelt to acknowledge the resident Great Horned Owl. After lunch we circled the lake on the usual roads and ended up at the Basin 2 West Bay. Several more swans and finally, the Eurasian Wigeon, spotted by Tony Timmons. By lunchtime the temperature had reached about 10 deg C and continued to rise reaching ~14 deg C and making a perfect Alberta Spring (almost) afternoon. Leaving Frank Lake we stopped in at Blackie to find mostly Starlings, and a few Eurasian Collared Doves. The list for Frank Lake and Blackie was: Checklists included in this summary: (1): Frank Lake--NW lookout/blind Date: Mar 19, 2016, 9:55 AM (2): Sutherland's Shelterbelt (private property) Date: Mar 19, 2016, 12:30 PM (3): Frank Lake--Basin 2 (Southeast Corner) Date: Mar 19, 2016, 2:15 PM (4): Frank Lake--Basin 2 (West Bay) Date: Mar 19, 2016, 3:05 PM (5): Blackie (hamlet) Date: Mar 19, 2016, 4:10 PM 650 Canada Goose -- (1),(3),(4) 4 Trumpeter Swan -- (1) 225 Tundra Swan -- (1),(4) 3 Gadwall -- (1) 2 Eurasian Wigeon -- (4) 60 American Wigeon -- (1),(4) 160 Mallard -- (1),(3),(4) 2 Northern Shoveler -- (4) 4550 Northern Pintail -- (1),(3),(4) 24 Canvasback -- (1),(4) 76 Redhead -- (1),(4) 5 Lesser Scaup -- (4) 150 Common Goldeneye -- (1),(4) 2 Gray Partridge -- (2) 1 Northern Harrier -- (4) 2 Bald Eagle -- (1),(3) 5 Killdeer -- (1),(2) 80 California Gull -- (1) 6 Rock Pigeon (Feral Pigeon) -- (3),(5) 4 Eurasian Collared-Dove -- (5) 2 Great Horned Owl -- (2) 1 Merlin -- (5) 5 Black-billed Magpie -- (1),(2) 1 Common Raven -- (3) 3 Horned Lark -- (1) 51 European Starling -- (2),(5) 2 American Tree Sparrow -- (1) 1 Song Sparrow -- (1) 8 House Finch -- (5) 20 House Sparrow -- (2),(5) From Blackie we stopped by Third Lake on the way back to Calgary. A huge number of birds there, somewhere between 4000 and 8000, generally somewhat distant. Mostly Pintails, but we also saw American Wigeon, Mallard, a few Canada Geese, and California Gulls. Clearly Pintails are on the move right now." Andrew Hart

Taken on 19 April 1967 - scan from a print. Paris in happier times. This photo was taken back in 1967, when we had been living in Doha, Qatar for about six months. When we left there, to return to England before going to live in Holland for a few months, we were able to stop off en route at a few places for between 2 and 5 days, including Beirut (4 days), Jerusalem (4 days), Cairo (2 days), along the River Nile to Luxor (5 days), Athens (4 days), Rome (2 days) and Paris (2 days).

Yesterday, 14 March 2015, I photographed this square mural in Blackie, Alberta, during a bird trip to the Frank Lake area. Blackie is a hamlet approximately 70 km SE of Calgary. I looked on Google, but was unable to find any details about this cowboy mural. On the far left edge of the photo, you can see part of the large grain terminal in Blackie. I went on a most enjoyable birding outing SE of the city, with a group of friends. Frank Lake, one of my favourite places, was our main destination. During the winter months, the gate is closed, so one has to walk in. We walked almost as far as the blind and then back to the cars. On this return walk, a patch of large, white, spotted feathers was found. A friend held this one up against her dark jeans so that I could get a photo (see next photo posted today). When I saw it, I had a bad feeling that this large feather belonged to a beautiful Snowy Owl. After searching on Google, I think that might be the closest answer, which would be really sad. Would really appreciate it if someone is able to correct or confirm - thanks! From Frank Lake, we called in at the huge community centre in High River, thinking we could eat our lunch there. It was so absolutely packed, we ended up eating outside by the cars. After more driving around the lake, we came back to Calgary via 306 Ave, E (alternative road numbers are 552/272) and 220 (Dunbow Rd). I think I have those road numbers correct. For most of the day, the wind was dreadful, making walking very difficult and extremely unpleasant! When I got home and checked yesterday's forecast for High River on the Weather Network, the temperature got up to around 15C and there was a Wind Warning in effect. A Wind Warning is issued when wind speeds are expected to or currently blowing steadily at 60 to 65 km/h (37 to 40 mph) or more, or winds gusting to 90 km/h (56 mph) or more. I will add the report from our leader, Andrew Hart, with permission, below. As usual, I did not see some of the birds listed, as I don't have binoculars. "We had 16 participants on this trip on a day when it was warm (generally 12-15 deg c) but, after about 10:30 am, extremely windy. We went straight to the outfall area near the blind. As we walked down to the edge of the water the wind seemed to pick up. We saw about 100 each of Redheads and Canvasback as well as Tundra Swans (many of which were flying over). Not that many Pintails, maybe 20+, much less than other recent observers have reported. The increasingly strong winds made observations tricky. We did not see the Eurasian Wigeon that others have reported, including today's report by Mike Sven, even though we were down by the effluent area where he saw them. Possibly the increasingly high winds made them seek shelter elsewhere. Some of the group saw a Cackling Goose identified by Tony Timmons, but it flew off before we could get everyone on it. Some of the birds we saw flying valiantly against the wind barely made any progress. We went to the High River recreation centre for lunch, discovering when we arrived that a number of community events were taking place and parking had overflowed to a nearby field. We did see one Eurasian Collared Dove in a nearby tree. The parking field had a few really muddy spots, so somehow in the confusion of leaving our group got split up. Most of us went on a clockwise circuit of the Frank Lake area. We stopped in at Basin 2 on the East side, but again the wind made observation difficult, although Howard Heffler did manage to pick out three Gadwall in a small slough. On our drive around we saw a few Horned Larks, but never more than small numbers at the same time, and sometimes just one or two. We met our lost fellow birders from the rec center car park in the Basin 3 car park, from which we could see 50 or so Pintails. We carried on to the shelterbelts just west of Frank Lake and picked up a Great Horned Owl and a Flicker. Leaving the Frank Lake area a few of us went on to Blackie. The winds were still roaring but we managed to find about 16 Eurasian Collared Doves, which were blowing around like chaff. The more detailed EBird summary is: Checklists included in this summary: (1): Frank Lake--NW lookout/blind Date: Mar 14, 2015, 9:50 AM (2): Frank Lake--Basin 4 Date: Mar 14, 2015, 1:15 PM (3): Frank Lake--Basin 3 Date: Mar 14, 2015, 1:25 PM (4): Blackie Date: Mar 14, 2015, 2:30 PM 1 Cackling Goose -- (1) 480 Canada Goose -- (1),(2),(3) 70 Tundra Swan -- (1),(3) 3 Gadwall -- (2) 26 American Wigeon -- (1),(2) 354 Mallard -- (1),(2),(3) 12 Northern Shoveler -- (1) 70 Northern Pintail -- (1),(3) 2 Green-winged Teal -- (1) 100 Canvasback -- (1) 100 Redhead -- (1) 10 Ring-necked Duck -- (1) 30 Lesser Scaup -- (1) 4 Bufflehead -- (1) 150 Common Goldeneye -- (1) 6 Common Merganser -- (1) 1 Bald Eagle -- (1) 42 California Gull -- (1),(3) 6 Rock Pigeon (Feral Pigeon) -- (2),(4) 16 Eurasian Collared-Dove -- (4) 4 Black-billed Magpie -- (4) 25 Common Raven -- (2),(3) 4 Horned Lark -- (3) 100 European Starling -- (3),(4) 1 House Finch -- (4) 100 House Sparrow -- (4) Andrew Hart"

On a day trip south of the city in August, a truck passed us with this unique design on it. Quite attractively done, despite the subject matter : ). Thought I'd post it today, seeing as Halloween is almost here.

Just for a total change in photo subject : ) Taken on 12 July 2011 at the Indian Village at Stampede Grounds, where a number of tepees are set up each year during Stampede week. Each tepee is decorated in a different colourful design.