Category Archives: wildlife

Lambs

Our visit to Maltby Farm gave us a chance to look at some of the wildlife that the farm has. They have a few sheep and there were some lambs in the enclosure too. Lambs can be a riot to watch when they are young since they have incredible energy and bound around the place. Clearly these were a few weeks older than that and they were taking a more lethargic approach to the day. Aside from munching on the available food, they were lying down and resting in the sun.

As sheep get mature, they lose a lot of the cuteness that they have when young. Some breeds are cute when adult but plenty aren’t. A bunch of lambs, though, are going to be a lot more appealing. Let’s not focus too much on how tasty they might prove to be…

Chickens

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Chatting with a work colleague recently, we were talking about Molbaks Garden Center in Woodinville which we have visited many times. She asked if we went to Flower World too and I had to admit I had never heard of it. It is in Maltby, about ten minutes from home but I had no idea it existed. It not only is a nursery but it also has a farm with a farm shop. A visit seemed in order.

There are a lot of chickens at Maltby Farm. There are a bunch of them roaming the park areas around the garden center. Within the farm ground, they have a large enclosure full of chickens and the eggs are sold in the shop. Chickens are interesting creatures since they come in such a wide variety of sizes and plumages. When the light is right, it really pulls the colors out of the feathers. They are also amusing to watch with the little battles that break out with surprising regularity.

Buzzed By A Bald Eagle

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We had a day out on Whidbey Island and we stopped off at Fort Casey to eat our lunch. We parked up near the lighthouse and there was a bald eagle hanging around along the cliff tops. The updrafts made soaring around a piece of cake for it. It landed in the top of a tree near us as we walked along the cliff. When we turned around and headed down the slope towards the fort, it started flying high above us and then appeared to swoop down into the bushes – presumably to catch a snack. We lost track of it at that point but a short while later it emerged from the bushes flying just above head height and straight towards us. I had the camera on the wrong settings to maximize my chance of getting a good shot but I still managed to get a few slightly blurry ones as it buzzed by.

Swallows Over the River

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After a visit to a shop in Renton, I stopped by the airport to see what was going on. I was taking a walk along the trail alongside the Cedar River that runs parallel to the runway. As I headed back to the car, I heard a noisy bird making its presence felt. Looking up at a power line across the water, there was an osprey a short distance away. I didn’t have anything other than my phone with me so went back to the car to grab a long lens and to see if it would wait around for me.

Sadly, it didn’t appreciate the situation and had gone by the time I returned. However, the river was not empty. Tons of swallows were swooping along its length feasting on the bugs above the water. Looking along the river towards the bridge from the Boeing ramp, you could see loads of them at work. Getting photos of swallows is not easy. They move very fast and do not hold course for long so getting a track on them with a long lens and keeping it is tough. The 500mm is a challenge for this but it is what I had.

There were tons of failures but you don’t get to see these. I was surprised how often I managed to track one and that the camera did a really great job of getting a focus. There was a little predictability of the flight paths which did help but, even so, I was rather pleased with the results. Also, given that these are still heavily cropped, to get this sharp was quite a result.

Killdeer With Attitude

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Nancy and I were at Meydenbauer Park in Bellevue when we saw this Killdeer. A crow was hopping about nearby and it seemed to be causing the killdeer some concern. We wondered whether the crow was going to harm it in some way when we suddenly realized that the killdeer was far from defenseless. It suddenly went on the attack and charged the crow which freaked out and took off. There was I worried about this bird and it was totally in control.

Heron Hang Out

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The end of the boardwalk at Nisqually brought me to a view over a piece of land that seemed to be the favored spot for the herons. I had never seen so many in such close proximity. They were hanging out on the grass rather than by the water so maybe this is a safe spot to rest after a busy session of fishing before heading back to the water to start feeding again. Periodically, one of them would head back to the mud flats to look for some food but the rest were just hanging around doing nothing much in particular but slowly wandering around their buddies.

Cattle Traffic Jam in Beaulieu

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For some reason, I don’t think this made it to a post previously. Nancy and I were going through some old shots from vacations in the UK and we made a stop in Beaulieu at the beginning of a trip nearly a decade ago. (This stop included me having a nap in the car as the jet lag caught up with me.). One of the funny things of this visit was that some cattle were wandering through the middle of the village. If you have ever been to Yellowstone, you know that the bison have priority over the cars. UK cattle might not have the same weight as a bison but I assure you that the average UK motorist is not going to try their luck.

How To Spook Geese

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I was riding along the Sammammish River Trail back in to Woodinville one weekend when the noise of geese suddenly filled the air. On the other side of the river from the trail are fields which often are filled with geese feeding. A large flock was gathered there on this day but their grazing had been interrupted by the arrival of a bald eagle. It flew across the area and barely changed course as it did so but it certainly startled the geese and they all took to the air.

They flew around in circles for a while waiting for the eagle to get safely out of the area. Then they gradually calmed down and more and more of them settled back in to the fields to resume eating. However, this was a slow process as they had clearly been spooked and weren’t going to relax easily. This was all starting as I cycled up but I did manage to pull my phone out and get a bit of video of this happening so here is the brief burst of excitement before things settled down again.

Watching You Watching Me

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When out looking for wildlife, it pays to keep your head swiveling. There are the things you are expecting to see but also the odd one you weren’t. It was close to high tide as I walked far out on the boardwalk at Nisqually but the tide had turned and the water was starting to flow out. As I glanced across, I saw three shapes in the water. Some seals were drifting out with the tide. Two of them were swimming along but one had stopped close to me and was staring directly at me. Consequently, he got photographed. We stared at each other for about a minute and then he disappeared under the surface and I didn’t see him again. The other two were long gone so I assume he was chasing to catch up with them.

Murrelets Feeding On the Dock

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When walking along the shore at Mukilteo, I will often see one or two Murrelets diving for food in the shallows along the edge of Puget Sound. They are not rare but nor are they particularly abundant. Consequently, I was rather surprised when at the new ferry terminal to see a large number of them swimming in the water around the new pier structures. There was a constant stream of them diving down and surfacing again.

I can only assume that something is growing on the surface of the steel posts that support the new loading spans. The birds would swim up to the posts, dive straight down for a while – presumably as they grabbed the food – and then surface at an oblique angle. The result was a cycle of birds going down and back up again. It looked really strange and seemed like something that would stop but there must be plenty to eat as they just kept going. I figured video was the best way to show what was happening so below is a short clip of them feeding away!