Bottoms Up

Why do they call them ducks? Could it be that it's simply because of this? The fact that they routinely duck under the water? I don't know, but this is one of the most fun things to watch. A whole bunch of ducks going down and then back up.

These ducks were an entertaining sight on an otherwise gloomy day. When I watched these ducks it was not on the most ideal of days. It was getting dark at about 3:00 in the afternoon. And on top of that, the sky was full of heavy clouds, and it was raining just enough to make it unpleasant.

The thing is that these ducks were still able to do the things they do all through this gloomy day. I realized while I watched them that the day didn't seem so bad after all. I wondered who else gets to sit there, yes I said sit, while watching as ducks somehow turn a gloomy day into a bright one.

Back up for air! She finally came back up from the water to see him waiting there patiently for her. As soon as she was up though, he took his turn to duck his head down into the water. This is a rare shot of both of them up at the same time. I was glad they were there helping me brighten my day.


Now for something completely different!

I received the Best Blog Award from my friend Nathan, over at Wild Facts. Go take a look at Nathan's blog. He features some of the most interesting and the strangest animals you've ever seen. Go ahead, you won't be sorry. And tell him Ratty sent you! You can find his post about the award here: Wild Award!

Thank you very much, Nathan!

Now the rules.

1. Post it on your blog together with the name of the person who has granted the award and his/her blog link.
2. Pass the award to 15 other blogs that you have recently discovered and think are great!

Nathan is a new friend so he may not know what all of you already know. That is the fact that I always cheat when I receive an award. I know, I'm terrible! I have my own very good reasons though. So what I'm going to do is present this award to all of you who comment here routinely who I haven't put in my sidebar yet. It's yours, all yours! Your official notification is when you read this post. It's a Best Blog Award, and I know you deserve it very much!

Birds In Flight

I have focused my attention to the sky from time to time. There are many different things up there that are hard to ignore. Whenever I plan to take pictures of birds I always heads straight for an area at one park where there are birds in the trees.

The only problem is that they don't stay there for long. They always fly away just when I try to get my shot. I usually stand there and helplessly watch them fly away. The other day though I lifted the camera in quick draw fashion, like a cowboy, and pulled the trigger. I was right on target.

That bird was lucky he wasn't an old west bad guy because he would've gone down with a thud while the townsfolk cheered me on. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm getting pretty good at aiming my camera at moving objects. I still don't know how I got so lucky to center this bird with only one shot.

This picture shows the first flock of birds that I've had the opportunity to get a picture of. I guess that's because I spend most of my time under the trees of the forest. There just isn't the same view when I have to look up through the branches.

Click on the pictures to get a better look at the different poses these flying birds are now frozen forever into.

Here's the second photo of this same high flying flock. This one shows more of the birds. They were flying by at top speed so I didn't have much time before they disappeared over the trees and they were gone forever. I'm glad I happened to look up just as they passed by overhead.

This last one happens to be one of the bigger birds I've seen out there. It was so big that it made a strange buzzing whirring sound as it flew over. It also didn't seem to have to flap it's wings very often because I didn't see it do it even once. And it had one of the strangest shaped tails I've ever seen on a bird. Odd, very odd.

So there we are! I hope you liked this short look at birds in flight today. I know it was kind of goofy, but this wouldn't be The Everyday Adventurer if it wasn't, now would it.