A Downy sort of day....

Today there were quite a few birds enjoying the fairly warm weather and checking out my feeders.

The Downy Woodpeckers are the ones that accept my tree limb strapped to the shepherds hooks most readily.  Mainly because that is where all the suet is.....their favorite!

I added the limb to give them a better place to land than on the metal poles.

Here is a lovely male.....

.....and a female checking out the left over peanut butter on the pine cone.

"Peek-a-boo!"

Their favorite suet cages were almost empty when I noticed the Downys hanging around, so I hustled out and filled all of them. 

One of them even tried the one with the decoration.  First one to eat from it so far this year that I've seen.  They really want their old tree back!  Especially since there is a hawk hanging around the feeders.  I have seen him 2-3 times but never when I have my camera handy.

One last shot.

Squirrel Sunday (Ok...Monday) and the last of my Ohio photos.....

I meant to post this yesterday. 

This squirrel was outside the nature center at Maumee Bay State Park.  We were in the nature center for at least a half hour and this squirrel never moved....or blinked.  I was beginning to wonder if it was stuffed!

I should make this one a caption contest.  Anyone have a good caption for this squirrel?

A birdhouse outside the center

They have a really neat statue, but it was hard to find a good spot to take a photo. I love how it shows all the different layers of nature here.

A Downy enjoying the tree in the feeding area.

Goldfinches doing the same.

There were two really cute little owls who are injured and can't be released in the wild.

A snake keeping warm under the lights.

Along the lake front there are numerous nature reserve areas.  This place gives tours, and I like their barn.  I'd really like to go back to this place with more time for looking at nature.

The weather vane atop the building.

I just liked this beautiful horse out enjoying the grass.

And we found an eagle sitting in a tree who was quite willing to pose for us!  So majestic looking!  He seems to know that he is the "king" of the birds.

This was a drive-by shot on the way there.  One of the many Ohio Bicentennial barn paintings.  They are all over Ohio and you can find many of them on a web site.

I'm sure someone can tell me what this "ghost" pod is that we found on the beach?
(NOTE: I've learned this is a Chinese Lantern pod.  How cool!  Thanks for the ID!)

Gulls, gulls, gulls.......

I was hoping to find some Bonapart Gulls up at Lake Erie, because Becky, at Woodynook Creations, had reported seeing them at her end of the lake.....the New York end.

When we stopped at the man-made lake and beach at Maumee Bay State Park there were a lot of gulls at one end.

I like gulls, even when it is only the very common Ring-billed Gulls like these.

They were enjoying the shallow water and washing up.

"Why don't you sit down George and rest your legs?"

"Leave me alone....I'm perfectly happy right here!"

Over near the beach on the bay, we saw these two at the edge of a parking lot....

....where someone was feeding them.  At least I have a couple in the air here to see their wings.

Two were down picking through the shell layer.

I had given up on finding a Bonapart and shot these 3 out in the field with the swans.  Well....I finally found a couple, but didn't realize it in time to get better shots!  The two on the left are smaller than the big Ring-billed on the left, and they have the black spot behind the eye.  So I did find a couple, but Becky has better shots of them, so check out her blog!

"Seven swans a swimming"......

 OK....I exaggerated.  There are only 5 swans a swimming, but we saw two others in a field.

I believe they are Tundra Swans.....plus a few Canada Geese and Ring-billed Gulls.

The one in front has a neck band.

Can see the band better here.

These are all on a small man-made lake with beach at the Maumee Bay resort.

We were told at the nature center that if we drove along the road we would see fields with 100's of Tundra Swans in them.  However, they must have all been off to the lake when we drove by and we didn't have enough time to go back later.  There were only these two in one flooded field with a few gulls.

Always show the new bird first :-).........

As you can maybe tell by my header shot, I have been somewhere other than southern Indiana.  We spent the last weekend near Toledo, Ohio where we had gone for our nephew's wedding.  We stayed at Maumee Bay State Park, and it is a beautiful place to stay even in the winter.  In between wedding stuff, we went birding (of course!).

I got to see a new bird for me....a Snow Bunting!  I didn't get any really excellent shots, but they sure are cute little birds.  I like the cinnamon color on their heads and the big white patches on the wings.

There were two of them and picking them out of their surroundings was a real challenge at times.

You can see here how well it blends with the driftwood mess on the beach.

"You mean you can't see me???"

My closest shot.  I seem to have a lot of trouble with backgrounds that are light like this, but I know it is the photographer and not the camera :-)  "Point and shoot" just doesn't work well in some settings.

The front and back view.

They have beautiful feathers and patterns.

Strolling the beach together.

There was a large band of shells on the beach and they were picking around in them.

I'm not quite sure if I am looking at Maumee Bay or Lake Erie, but basically it is one and the same.

More photos of birds we saw in my next post.