Cormorant Splashdown

Something I should have mentioned in yesterday's post but didn't was the circling of Lakeside Park by a cormorant. The cormorant circled the lake 6 times before finally moving on, and I did take a photo of its flight that I never included as it was really blurry. This morning at the same time, the cormorant again circled the lake, but gradually lowered with each lap. It seemed for a moment to change its mind as it started to ascend before finally coming down, landing in the middle of the lake. I stayed well out of sight behind the willow trees and watched as the cormorant craned its neck, looking all around. It seemed to be unsettled, perhaps there was some movement on the trail. Whatever was moving was cause enough for the cormorant to take back to the air after only a minute or two. I was lucky to catch a blurred photo of the cormorant leaving a huge splash behind as it took off on another dark, overcast morning:


I have been complaining to no end about the dark mornings and the lack of light and I know this should be obvious, but in my defence, the mornings are rather late in the day for me. Today, I realized that I do have a built-in flash on my cameras. Not very effective for telephoto shots, but up close, it's perfect. This is a bark stink bug which I found in the undergrowth on the edge of the lake:


One of the reasons it has taken me so long to complete this post is because I cannot identify this moth. There are some British moths which are very similar, but nothing so far for Ontario. Even a google image search drew a blank. If anyone knows the common name of this small moth, please leave a comment below:


A bumblebee on a Himalayan balsam flower (touch-me-not) is frozen in time by my camera's flash:


As I was lining up a shot, I noticed all these flies around me and wondered what the focus of their attention was. I have to say that my near vision is gradually fading with my age. It wasn't until I looked through my lens that I realized they were wasps and I was standing over their nest. The wasps were photographed while cleaning up the debris from my clumsy feet. Thankfully I did not get stung:


I'm having a little trouble identifying the flowering plant in this photo. If anyone knows what it is then please leave a comment:


This swamp milkweed leaf beetle appeared to be on the road to happiness with its next meal of aphids directly ahead, but it actually feeds on the juices from inside the milkweed plant:


One more photo of a warbling vireo which seems to be the only warblers who will stay still long enough for me to take a photo. The warblers are definitely migrating through Lakeside Park as I have seen quite a few with differing markings, but they are not so easy to catch with a manual focus lens:



Copyright © wildlakeside.blogpot.com 2019 Scott Atkinson All Rights Reserved.
Location: Lakeside Park, 206 Lakeside Dr, Kitchener, ON N2M 4C5, Canada

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Kingfisher's Blind Spot

Image
The belted kingfisher is a bird that I regularly see and hear every morning at Lakeside Park. They give off flashes of white from their flight feathers that contrast against the shaded trees on the far bank of Shoemaker Lake, as they swoop from perch to perch,. They call when they approach anywhere near, warning others that I'm there. I feel at times that they are mocking me... I see you! Their eyesight is so keen that it is almost impossible to get close enough for a photo, from any angle. The only time I have been able to photograph them was when the fledglings appeared last year and had not quite developed their sense of what to be aware of,  https://wildlakeside.blogspot.com/2019/07/kingfishers-at-last.html . I was quite happily photographing bumblebees and sweat bees, as they busily worked on a group of buttonbush (Cephalanthus Occidentalis) shrubs on the sunny side of Shoemaker Lake when I first heard the belted kingfisher this morning. The kingfisher was ...
Read more

Hide and Seek

Image
Do birds play? Young animals do, so why not birds? This family of young wrens appeared to be having a great time playing this morning: Darting in and out of cover, chasing each other. Perhaps honing their survival skills: The split in a dead tree trunk, which looked as if it had been folded in half, made the perfect hiding place: I am no expert when it comes to Canadian birds. You can probably tell from my accent that I am from the UK, and I am still learning all about the birds in Ontario. So, if anyone can help identify this bird then please let me know: A juvenile, but I am not sure if it is a flycatcher or an oriole? It was seen feeding on the same mulberry bushes as in my post yesterday. I also found a few bushes at the side of the trail on my way home with some fruit within arms reach. I picked what I could and left what I couldn't reach for the birds. I love mulberries too: My post titled "Catbird Sings" showed a photo of a coopers hawk ...
Read more

Thrushes and Blue-Winged Teal

Image
I must admit that I am no expert when it comes to thrushes in Ontario. I am well acquainted with thrushes in the UK, but these guys have completely different names. I will do my best to hopefully identify correctly. There are I believe two possible candidates,  Swainson's thrush and the hermit thrush. Very similar-looking birds. One outstanding difference between them appears to be a white ring around the eye of the hermit thrush compared to a buffy eyering on Swainson's thrush. Another distinguishing detail is the colour of their tailfeathers. The hermit thrush has more of a cinnamon colour to its tailfeathers, and this photo does show that. A white eyering and cinnamon tailfeathers, I'm going with a hermit thrush. This photo also shows both the cinnamon tailfeathers and the white eyering. There were many of these thrushes working their way through the leaf litter of the woodland on the far side of Shoemaker Lake. They were very sensitive to any movement. I h...
Read more