Grainy Days and Sundays

The title of this post is not misspelt, Sunday was a really grainy day for taking photographs. There was very little available light and it was attempting to rain in spits and spots. But, just because my camera was using a faster ISO and the photos are grainy, it does not mean they are unusable. From the reed beds on the far side of Lakeside Park, we have this angry-looking bird.


It is, of course, a grackle and not angry at all, just displaying. Let's take a closer look at that display in action.

Grackles puff out their feathers from head to tail when they display. And from the side, they look just as impressive.



I've been keeping an eye on a pair of red-bellied woodpeckers who have gradually chipped out the perfect nesting hole for themselves way up at the top of a dead tree. This photo shows one of the woodpeckers apparently admiring its work, but there was a problem.

Prime nesting holes are at a premium at Lakeside Park, and the red-bellied woodpeckers had a squatter.




The red-bellied woodpeckers rallied together. They flew directly at the nesting hole one after another, and that was enough to scare and evict the unwelcome starling.







On the far side of the lake, just at the top of the bankside, there is a small clearing, and that is where I found this northern flicker quite happily foraging its way through the leaf litter.











Northern flickers are woodpeckers, but they like to feed on the ground using their bill to dig into the soil for ants and beetles.
Ready for lift-off, and even in poor light, this female red-winged blackbird's feathers show good contrast.

One final redeeming photo of a grackle, to show that they do not look aggressive all the time. They are magnificent!

Copyright © wildlakeside.blogspot.com 2020 Scott Atkinson All Rights Reserved.
Location: Lakeside Park, 206 Lakeside Dr, Kitchener, ON N2M 4C5, Canada

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