Larry and I took a break from our respective projects yesterday to sit on the swing and drink some water. We heard a high-pitched cheeping and I saw a huge bird carrying something in its talons land on a pine tree limb above us. It was a Red-Tailed Hawk calling its mate for lunch. I didn't realize such a large bird could have such a little voice. It sounded like a chicky. But lo' and behold, along came its mate and they flew off together around the point to snack on the little bird or mouse (we couldn't tell exactly what it was) the first hawk caught. They were beautiful. The symphony of bird song is so relaxing. Working outside each day, I listen to it instead of my iPOD.
"Lord love a duck!" Right now, there are three ducks sitting high in another pine tree we can see from our living room window. They are in sillouette, so we can't tell what kind of ducks they are. I've never seen ducks sitting in a tree twenty-five feet off the ground. Who knew? They are flying from tree to tree. There must be a ducky mating ritual afoot. It is spring now, and we've seen lots of mating going on around here.
We've seen pairs of several kinds of ducks: Mallard and Bufflehead mostly. We've also seen Loons, Coots, Cormorants and lots of geese. They swim in groups mostly, but we have seen some lone birds calling for a mate. They swim along and dive for fish. Then they pop up again and dive some more. It's very entertaining. Blue Heron and Kingfisher perch on our dock, sometimes eating their catch of fish. They are beautiful birds.
Larry wants to make a Wood Duck box for our shore so we can attract them. We haven't seen any lately but the year after we bought this place is the only time we think we saw them. If it was Wood Ducks, they did something amazing we wish we could see again. A flock of hundreds of little ducks were swimming together. They hung out around our cove all season. The most amazing thing we saw was that when a predator bird flew overhead, the little ducks quickly swam together in a very large, tight circle and all flapped their wings simultaneously. We believe it was to fool the hawk or eagle into thinking they were one very large creature. It worked! We witnessed them doing this several times that season. It was great, but they have not returned. This is a huge lake, so maybe they are visiting each cove in turn. We hope they come back to ours. It was very cool.
There was a large, dinner-plate-size turtle, Larry calls a Cooter sunning on a fallen tree near the shore yesterday. I've seen them on that tree before. Sometimes several Cooters hang out on it. It is a fun site. As the weather gets warmer, we see little Cooter heads pop up in the water, only to disappear underwater and pop up elsewhere. We have fun counting the heads and keeping track of their numbers. The most we've seen in the water at a single sitting on the dock is eighteen. One spring when we had floating wood in the lake, we saw three Cooters getting friendly with one another. This is one horny place!
Once my brother-in-law gets his boat in the water, I want to pay a visit to Purple Martin Island. The Purple Martins nest there and return each year. People around here install gourd trees to attract them to their yards. The Martins eat mosquitoes, and are very handy to have around. This will be another project someday.
Spring is here, and the lake is alive with "randy" critters of all shapes and sizes. Love is all we need!
No comments:
Post a Comment