Anne Elliott's photos with the keyword: 2009

My son was born in Seria, Brunei, Borneo "MANY" years ago. Population is a mix of Malays and Chinese. Every year, I look forward to seeing the design for the new Chinese New Year (Year of the Ox) postage stamp(s) for Canada. I reckon they are some of the most beautiful stamps produced in Canada each year. Thanks once again, fd, for creating the Motivator program : )

I've kind of been saving this image for "something" special, but I wasn't sure what. Then I thought this vivid, red Sunflower might be a bright and cheery way to wish all my American friends a very Happy Thanksgiving on Thursday. Decided to post it a little bit early, in case some of you are so busy either travelling or preparing things ahead of time for your delicious turkey dinner, that you won't have time to check in to Flickr closer to the time. Have a happy, thankful and safe time - and my special thoughts are with those of you who are unable to be with family or friends on Thanksgiving. I know I am thankful to know all you great American Flickr friends : ) Stay safe. (Note to self because I have such a lousy memory: in Explore #72, but Scout didn't pick it up).

Just playing around - instead of doing much more important, urgent things, LOL! I think maybe I should have used dark green for the background instead of black, and chosen a few lighter images to mix in with the darker ones. Might just upload the dark green one to replace this, though I find the green lines more distracting. Anyone else finding Flickr horribly slow/quiet yesterday and today??? 1. White beauty , 2. Colour in the forest , 3. A different colour , 4. Weird and wonderful , 5. Mushroom magic , 6. A splash of yellow , 7. What a colour , 8. Light and darkness , 9. Yesterday's beauty Created with fd's Flickr Toys

We live in such a great and free country, which is something to be remembered each and every day! A special wish and thank-you for all those Canadians who are serving our country, especially overseas! This is Canada's 142nd birthday - we are so young! Created with fd's Flickr Toys .

Though House Sparrows tend not to be popular little birds, you have to admit that they are quite attractive. I love these little birds, with their beautifully patterned feathers. This male was actually down at the Calgary Zoo yesterday (flying freely, of course!) and I was quite pleased with this backlit (?) shot. "House Sparrows are not closely related to the other North American sparrows: they belong to the family of Old World sparrows (Passeridae)." From Birds of Alberta by Chris Fisher and John Acorn.

We watched this gorgeous pair of Mountain Bluebirds getting into an argument with the local Tree Swallow over who would get the nesting box this year, LOL. For now, Mr. and Mrs. Bluebird seem to have won. We had a lovely day out of the city today and were treated to these Bluebirds, a beautiful Yellow-bellied or hybrid Sapsucker that was cleaning out a tree cavity, and a pair of nesting Great Gray Owls (sorry, location is being kept secret). The female was on a very high nest - all we could see was the underneath of the end of her tail. The male was a little way away, perched in a very tall tree, deep within the branches. I took plenty of photos of him in the hope that I might get one that was OK, but the light was atrocious and so all but maybe one or two will have to be deleted. We also saw an American Dipper sitting very still in the middle of the Elbow River. The rest of the day we've had heavy rain : (. Actually, you can see some rain streaks in my photo. I did ask my youngest daughter to please leave the rain behind in Vancouver, but she seems to have brought it to Calgary today : ) "Bluebirds have no blue pigments in their feathers. Instead, each feather barb has a thin layer of cells that absorb all wavelengths of color except blue. Only the blue wavelength is reflected and scattered, resulting in their blue appearance to our eyes." From Wild Birds Umlimited. Fascinating stuff : )

I saw this whole huddle (?) of adorable Canada Goose goslings yesterday, when I went with Ron (Flickrite Ronaldok) down to the Coaldale Bird of Prey Centre near Lethbridge in southern Alberta. They were hanging out with Mom and Dad near one of the ponds at the Centre. We'd been watching several goslings and then suddenly Mom stood up and revealed this tightly packed bundle of downy feathers : )

Just one of the 70+ hawks I saw on Saturday when I went with Ron down to southern Alberta, near Lethbridge, to the Coaldale Bird of Prey Centre. Every few seconds on the drive there and back, we seemed to see yet another Hawk. Just an amazing day! How lucky we are to have all these majestic birds flying our skies and perching on fence posts : )

Another shot of the huge, female Pileated Woodpecker that we saw a few days ago in a local park. She and her mate flew from tree to log to tree to tree, giving us a few different locations for our images. Amazingly, we were able to get a few shots with no annoying branches in the way : ). It's never a good idea to stand below a tree with a Pileated Wioodpecker in it - they can make those huge chunks of tree bark FLY! This shot was taken in one of those exceedingly rare split seconds where the bird is actually still. The rest of the time they are hammering away, resulting in too many shots with a blurry head : )

This beautiful Bald Eagle was a delight to photograph at the end of January, at the Calgary Zoo. Came to within just a few feet away, allowing for some pretty close shots, which are always my favourites : ). This way, when I see them in the wild, I can picture what they really look like.

Another shot of this Clark's Nutcracker, perched on top of someone's car in the parking lot at Lake Louise, past Banff, in Banff National Park (Rocky Mountains). Rather like Grey Jays, the Nutcrackers will fly down when they see people - though I have yet to have one of these on my hand like the Chickadees, Nuthatches and Downy Woodpecker, LOL! They have learned that people means FOOD. Not sure what created the bokeh : ). It was very cold at the Lake, which is why this normally sleek bird was so puffed up. After walking around, when we returned to the parking lot, there was not a single bird to be seen anywhere : )

This is one of the two Northern Hawk Owls that a friend and I saw on Monday, N of Cochrane (i.e. NW of Calgary). I happened to catch it having a good stretch, very high up in a tall tree. I did remove a thin branch that cut across the tail, as I just found it extremely distracting and annoying. Yes, I admit it, I altered an image, LOL! Then, as if the thrill of Monday wasn't enough, I was invited by another friend to go back to the very same area this afternoon!! The sky was as blue as can be (just like on Monday) and we found THREE of these owls in the area. Unbelievable! The icing on the cake was yet to come, as we soon found out. A few moments later, on our way out of the area, there was a female Moose in a wooded field. To these two friends who enabled me to get out of the city (where I won't drive for the most part) and see these incredible sights - thank you SO much!

Yesterday, I spent a wonderful day with friends at Lake Louise, out past Banff. Near Castle Mountain, we stopped to take photos of Ravens that were hanging around a pull-off. Smart birds that they are, they have learned that people probably stop here and maybe eat a snack - and they love food! In the city, it's impossible to get a photo of a Raven, so we were really happy to get this opportunity. The weather was beautiful, around +10C, (apart from being very cold at Lake Louise), though the dazzling sunlight created very harsh shadows. I think we have passed on our recent bitter winter weather to those living in eastern Canada - sorry, everyone : ) Honest!