Blue Grass Fish and Wildlife area......

Thanks to my in-laws, we found another neat wildlife area north of town, called the Blue Grass Fish and Wildlife area. This is 2, 532 acres of former stip mining land and has 28 lakes/pits (600 acres of water). If only I had known about this place back in the spring! We didn't see any water fowl while there, but did not get to explore it that fully. The lakes are beautiful and have lots of walking area around them and boat launch areas. We saw fishermen on every lake. One huge area is set aside for no wildfowl hunting (yeah!) including nesting area and lakes.

The scenery is wonderful!

Small minnows in the lake.

Crawdad hole

Killdeer.....we saw quite a few of these, but I wasn't fast enough to get many photos. Something more to look for next spring.....baby killdeer!

I loved the real fine grasses growing in this area! Almost like spider webs.

A close-up of the fine grass

Very shy yellow grasshopper peeking out at me.

Mike pointed out this cool looking plant in the lake.

I think it looks like a leaf rake :-) Loved it with the reflection.

Sun getting lower gleaming off the water

Wish this was us! Mike has started pricing canoes and kayaks :-)

Lots of cattails and tall grasses around the lake edges with only small areas for a fisherman to get up close.

Nearing the end of the day, so we headed to the nearest eating place.....

Great food and cold beer (or iced tea) :-)

Squirrel Sunday.....

Hey folks out there..................how about a joke??

Squirrels had overrun three churches in town. After much prayer, the elders of the first church determined that the animals were predestined to be there. Who were they to interfere with God's will? they reasoned.

Soon, the squirrels multiplied.The elders of the second church, deciding that they could not harm any of God's creatures, humanely trapped the squirrels and set them free outside of town. Three days later, the squirrels were back.
It was only the third church that succeeded in keeping the pests away. The elders baptized the squirrels and registered them as members of the church. Now they only see them on Christmas and Easter!
Ha!..ha...ha! Alright.....so I'm not a standup comedian.

Not so yellow Howell wetlands and the Howell train yards....

My day at the wetlands really did show me more than yellow... My favofite ducks were there, but their number has shrunk to only 4-5.

The Canada geese were all on the boardwalk preening their feathers....sort of a "goose beauty parlor", so I didn't cross that set of boardwalks and left them alone.

These little purple flowers were near the edge of the swamp

The tall grasses stand above the sea of yellow

Some taller greens among the yellow

Leftover bits after going to seed

A sparrow was sneaking among the grasses, but didn't want me to take its photograph. I thought maybe it had a nest down among the grasses.

A man with 2 dogs finally came and scared the geese off the boardwalk. It took me by surprise while I was photographing the meadow, so I wasn't very quick with the camera.

Complimentary colors....purple and yellow

Little white morning glory type flowers winding along the grass stems

The yellow butterflies would land on the path in front of me when they weren't dancing among the flowers.

I like the thorny appearance of the stems as much as the thistles themselves....the bee and butterfly were just "cream" for this shot of the stems and thorns :-)

The Howell train yards are just down the road from the Howell wetlands, so I took a few shots just for you, Becky and Gary at Woodynook :-) The road crosses over the tracks and you can stand on a bridge and take pictures (if you find a safe place to park).

Mike's grandfather was an engineer on the trains and so was one of his cousins.

Mike showed me where this area is, and he says it has changed a lot since when his grandfather was an engineer.

One train was very obligingly traveling through as I shot pictures.

Yellow as far as the eye can see!......

I certainly didn't go to the wetlands looking for yellow..... .....but that is exactly what I got everywhere I looked!

The meadow was full of yellow flowers of several kinds and yellow grasses that were sometimes as tall as I am!

Sprinkled among the yellow and green, there were spots of purple and white flowers.

Even the CAT sitting waiting to dig for a new building was yellow surrounded by more yellow!

3 golden skippers on the yellow flowers....do you see them?

Yellow butterflies were flying everywhere and posing nicely for me, when they weren't chasing each other or flying past.

Seriously.....there were a lot of these yellow butterflies, almost like they knew that they were the perfect blend with the flower mix.

A different yellow flower

I have pictures of this large white flower (with a purple center to stay with the theme) but as I was photographing it, this yellow butterfly landed in the center and spread its wings!

Even this milkweed pod covered with bugs was yellowed.

This was the strangest part of all.....I was searching the swamp area for turtles when all of a sudden goldfinches (yellow!) landed on all the twigs sticking out of the swamp. I do not know what they were eating or doing. Maybe eating the duckweed???

They were a bit far away for good shots

One perfect yellow in a sea of yellow :-)

Yellow flowers, golden skipper

Golden butterfly unfolding on the yellow flowers.

OK.....if that isn't enough yellow to make anyone smile, I give up! Sure brighten my day.....despitte the gloomy skies and threat of rain!

I actually saw a couple things that weren't yellow that I want to post, so you may get more of this walk tomorrow along with Squirrel Sunday.

SkyWatch Friday....

The sky was just so pink the night I took this last week!

The bottom two photos were from another night that wasn't as pink, but more purple.

Check out more SkyWatch photos by clicking on the icon on my sidebar.

Thanks to the hosts for their great site!