Wildlife at Home, the Wetlands and Lakeside Park

No Lakeside Park for me today. With contractors coming in the early hours to replace a bathtub, I'd be house sitting for the best part of the day. A good opportunity to capture what wildlife my feeders are attracting in our garden. I set up a tripod with a good view through the patio doors. I also wanted to try out the second hand Soligor 350mm lens which I'd upgraded with a lens hood to hopefully reduce flare. I'll post the pictures as taken. First off is a house finch, which we have many being attracted to the sunflower seeds in the feeders: We also have house sparrows, and you'd think they'd dominate, being larger, but not at all. They actually wait their turn after the house finches. Here's a male house sparrow, waiting: Lots of chickadees, and I do love them as they are a close relative to the blue tits, great tits, coal tits and my favorite, the long-tailed tits from the UK. Here is a chickadee with the bath all to itself: A few you...

My morning started well with a sighting of the beaver, just before it disappeared under the water as it  headed home for the day. Its schedule is nocturnal, as is mine: Just beside the parking area at Lakeside Park is the Greenbrook water treatment plant. It is surrounded by a fence, trees and shrubs and that is where I spent almost my entire morning. I had no need to move at all. There was something special about one fir tree in particular which was attracting lots of attention. First I heard and then saw the young kingbirds in that tree. They have finally left their home in the highest tree at the park I could fill this post with photos of the kingbirds; they were everywhere, and I took so many, but more interesting is my first photo of a tiny hummingbird on the same fir tree. Not my first sighting, as I saw them much earlier in the year, collecting nesting material from last year's reed heads, but I was unable to take any photos then: There were young Baltimo...