The Scream of The Birds

Yesterday I was sonically assaulted by blackbirds. Nothing like this has ever happened to me before, so I wasn't exactly prepared for it. I had to move fast. That's the only way I can say it in so few words, but there's more to the story, so let me tell you exactly what happened.

I was sitting there watching something terrible on TV when suddenly I heard a horribly loud high pitched screaming coming from outside. It could have been some kind of machine ready to explode or maybe a gigantic tea kettle going off, but I knew immediately that it was not either of those. It was birds, thousands of them.

It was the sound of very many birds singing, but I don't think I have ever heard so many of them at the same time. I looked out the window and I saw that every tree in town was covered with them. There must have been hundreds of thousands of them out there. I've never seen or heard so many birds in my life. My very first instinct was to run and grab my camera, which I did.

After I got back I began taking pictures. I didn't take many because I knew they'd all be too similar. And I also remembered to get some video, which interrupted my picture taking. I'm really glad I got the video because my pictures are terrible and they don't come anywhere close to showing the sheer number of birds.

But what kind of birds were these? After reviewing my pictures and video, I saw that they were blackbirds. I always thought that there would only be one kind of bird in a flock, but there were at least two different kinds of blackbird here.

Most of these birds were the standard Red-Winged Blackbirds that I've seen many times before. But as you can see in the circled area in the picture above, some had yellow heads. These are called, predictably, Yellow-Headed Blackbirds. I've never seen this kind before this. Pretty cool!

And now here's my video. I have to warn you before you watch this video that you will hear the loud scream of the birds when you click that button. So if you're in a place that needs quiet, then maybe you should wait until later to watch it. Even so, watch it now anyway, because it'll be more fun that way. So this is my newest episode of Rat TV. Let's see if you can watch the whole thing without turning the sound down.

I included these last two pictures just to try to give you the best view I can. This one above has some of the birds in flight. I think that's cool in pictures. I'm not sure any of the pictures are what I was hoping for.

Maybe I should have processed the pictures a bit to give them a bit of zing. I could have brightened them up a bit or done something even cooler. But I was in kind of a hurry to share this post with you. So you get the raw version this time. Maybe I'll make a special post with one fixed up picture just to see what it might look like. Maybe.

The darkness in the pictures is because it was a dark and wet day. We just had another blizzard the night before, and the temperatures were now too high for the snow to remain. It was still snowing while all the snow on the ground was melting away. I think spring may be finally here. (I keep saying that!)

This has been a longer post than I intended. I hope you were interested enough to be able to read it all. Even if you couldn't I'm glad you stopped by. And with that, I'll talk to you later!

My Fun Bison Encounter

I have a herd of bison to share with you today. There are pictures and a video that shows what I found on my newest adventure. These bison are the completely wild ones from Broken Kettle Grasslands that I've shown you before. But I think maybe I have better pictures this time.

The bison have been coming up kind of close recently so I've been able to get pretty good pictures. I feel lucky about this because most people that drive that road never see them at all. Most people don't even know the road is there because it's just an old unremarkable dirt road in the country.

Here's on that was standing off a little by itself. I thought you might like a good close-up of just one.

This picture shows you what I saw while I was standing there looking at them. You can see they weren't very close, but I could see them pretty well. I'm glad I have a good zoom on my camera.

Notice there is a pond separating them from me. That pond might be the reason they've been coming down to this area of the grasslands. There are other ponds in their home, but maybe they just like this one right now.

If you look closely you can see a couple of the bison hiding in the tall grass. There were lots more standing in that grass. It was kind of hard to find them all. Every time I looked again I'd find another one.

The herd is kind of big. You can't really tell that from the pictures. I think the video does a little better job of that.

I did a little better job with this episode of Rat TV than the last one. This video is the second one where I used the Windows 10 Photos app to create it. This time I added a little special effect. Can you spot it?

If you like bison then you'll like this video. As you can see by the pictures, there are plenty of them here.

Since I've been a little slow with my blogging recently my words here are a bit clumsy. I'll be getting back into things now that fall is over. I wish I could solve that fall thing I have. But it's too late to try again this year, so I'm just going to enjoy the winter.

I've been out a bit more lately so I have plenty of material to share with you now. I'll have more on that in my next post. And I now have a good reason to go out to some good places to explore a bit more, so I'll have lots of good stuff in the future. I'll bring that all to you soon. And until then I'll talk to you later.

Wild Turkeys At Broken Kettle Grasslands

Today I'll share with you some genuine wild turkeys in their natural habitat. These aren't city turkeys that I've shown you before or turkeys that lurk by the side of a busy road. These turkeys live inside a place called Broken Kettle Grasslands, which is the largest area of free wild prairie left in America. These turkeys are truly wild and free.

I thought with Thanksgiving coming up tomorrow this would be a perfect time to share these turkeys with you. For those of you who are not American, we celebrate Thanksgiving here every year to show our thanks for what we have. We think of it as part of what being an American is all about.

As you can see in the top left of this turkey photo, there is that mysterious object from my previous post. Before I go on I have to admit that I lied to you again. I do that much more often than you'd think. I'm a terrible liar. I knew what this was all along. I just wanted you to find out for yourself. It's more fun that way, and now you'll remember it longer than you would have otherwise.

But I'm still not going to come right out and tell you. Where would the fun in that be? If you really want to know the answer to what the mystery object is, then go to my last post and read the comments. It's there that you will find the answer. When you're finished you will feel happy and exhilarated because of that fun little quest I sent you on.

My newest episode of Rat TV is an interesting experiment I'm trying. The Windows 10 Photos app has a new feature where you can make your own videos with a few simple clicks of your mouse. I made this with a combination of pictures and a video. Let's see how it turns out.

The app to make the video is pretty cool. It enabled me to do in a few seconds some of what it took me hours to accomplish before. I think I'll still use my main video editing software for special stuff, but this quick app is good enough for most things.

I've been telling you recently how I've been having a bit of trouble with my nature stuff. Some of it came from a bit of fall depression that happens to me every year. But much of it also came from just being too busy for any of this fun stuff.

I think I may have solved this problem now. I have now finally found a time in the day to set aside for my blogging activity. I don't usually do much of anything else during this time so I think I have plenty of time to get my blogging done. So after a short time to organize everything just a bit I think I may be able to get back up and running like I want. And with that, I'll talk to you later.

Ratty's Nature Video

I'm going to try something different today. Have you noticed it yet? I have no pictures. Just a video. I wouldn't have been interested in the pictures anyway this time. I only really care about the video right now, so I cut out all the other stuff to get right to the point.

This video features some of the things that I've seen around here in the past month. There are some butterflies, bison, and sunflowers. I also have a few other things in here. My videos aren't masterpieces, but I still think you'll be entertained. So give this one a try because I think you'll like it. I'll talk to you later.

Wild Bison Closeup

I had a strange feeling I should go over to Broken Kettle Grasslands and look around a bit. I've been going there a lot this summer, but I had a special feeling this time in the late afternoon. I didn't know what I'd find, but I thought it might be something special.

There is an area there where a lone bison has been hanging out for some reason. I shared pictures of that one with you before. So this time I slowed my truck down a bit to see if he was still there. Maybe I could get some better pictures of him. Yup, he was there.

But when I looked off to the distant hills in the background, I saw what I was really looking for. There was the whole herd on the top of the hills. It was easiest to see them at the top, but I saw them everywhere on the hill. Some were coming down too.

My newest episode of Rat TV features these bison that I saw this day. I made this one a little more entertaining, like the last one. I've decided that I'm going to produce many of my videos in this way from now on. I'll still share some raw video from time to time, but I think this new way is more fun for everyone.

On my second drive through on my way back through the road here I saw that the other bison had made their way down the hill. It looks like they had come all the way down to retrieve their lost friend. He had been gone from the herd for many days. Now they had come to take him home.

I'm not sure these wild bison are very used to humans, so I tried to stay as quiet as possible and tried not to disturb them. Even though they never really came very close to where I was standing, they were close enough for some decent pictures.

I haven't been back there since this visit, but I'll go back in a few days. Who knows? Maybe they're still there. Maybe the rest of the herd has even come down from the top of the hills. Or maybe they have returned to the wilder parts of the grasslands. I guess I'll find out then. I'll talk to you later.

Ratty's Nature

My pictures today show the pond that had some ducks swimming around in it. I recently had a post featuring them. This pond isn't the star of my post this time. This time the best feature of today's post is the video at the bottom. You're really going to like it.

But first, let me tell you a little about the pond since I have these pictures here just waiting for their story to be told. I've told you I keep seeing water birds in this pond. Every time in fact. But that was then.

This weekend when I went to find some more birds there weren't any at all. I thought my luck would be bad that day, but I got plenty of other pictures and things to share with you from that adventure. And even without the birds, this pond is still pretty nice to look at.

But let's move on to the star attraction.

This video is my best episode of Rat TV by far. This isn't just a boring video of an animal or two just standing there for 30 seconds. You'll actually like this one a lot because I put a lot of work into it, and because it's good this time. This one is unlike any of my previous videos.

My video today features just some of the things I see in the countryside around where I live. I couldn't feature everything in such a short time, but I got a lot in. I'll always have future videos to show you my newest nature findings. I'll talk to you later.

Ducks In The Water

I saw some ducks recently in a swampy pond at Deer Creek nature area. You might think that's no big deal, but it really is to me. Let me tell you why.

For some reason, I don't see many ducks around here. There is a lot of water here, but none that water birds really like to visit very much, except this one place. So far every time I've visited this pond I've seen water birds of some sort. But nowhere else.

Until just recently I usually forget this place, but I'll be visiting very often from now on just so I can get some good bird pictures. These today are far from my best. Next time I'll have to try to get a little closer so I get some actually good pictures for you.

The one thing that I did find out was that these ducks aren't the usual kind I get. Usually, my ducks are the standard Mallards that I see a lot. These ducks are clearly not Mallards.

From what I can tell these appear to be Wood Ducks. You can't get a good look at them from my pictures, but the head of the mother seems to give away the identity.

I have a new episode of Rat TV for you today! You'll like this video of Ducks In The Water because I made it short enough to keep you happy. I'm extra pleased with this one because I used a new video editor on it. Lightworks is my new video editor. Once I learned a little about how to use it I'm very happy with how my first video turned out.

This video of the ducks was actually two videos that I took, and I needed to merge them into one. For awhile before this, I was just uploading my videos straight to Youtube. I've never been happy with that. Even though my videos aren't much, I still like to enhance them just a bit.

The picture above is a screenshot I took from the video. I added the picture in at the last moment. I used to get pictures like this years ago in an old piece of software I used to use for my videos. I wanted to see if I could do it again now. The good news is that I can now do it again. So now even if my other pictures don't satisfy me enough, I can still get some things from the videos.

I watched this family of ducks disappear into the weeds three times. At first, I thought they were two different groups, but after looking at the pictures they appeared too similar to be different ducks.

I once saw an Egret in this pond so I know other birds come here too. I didn't have my camera with me back then, but I'll be sure to have it every time from now on. And I think I'll visit this place again this weekend to see what's going on. Who knows what I might find. I'll talk to you later.

Pond At Deer Creek

I found a beautiful place to visit the other day. It is a pond at the north end of a place called Deer Creek Wildlife Management Area. I guess this is a kind of nature park, but you would probably never know it was there unless you had the computer to help you.

Most nature parks are kind of set aside so you definitely know when you enter them, but not this place. It looks like the surrounding farmland, but there are no crops growing in the fields. It's all just mostly grassland and hills.

But then you find places like this pond. There is a small entrance to the pond with a path leading up to it. As soon as you get to the pond a wave of positive emotion hits you. At least it did for me. I felt totally at peace. I knew as I was standing there at the edge of that pond that I'd be back many more times.

Today I have another episode of Rat TV for you. It's a short video because I always keep my videos short so you don't get bored. You don't have to watch it, but you'll feel better if you do.

You will see and hear that it was a windy day when I was there. There were a few other sounds that are difficult to hear. But if you listen closely you will hear a clue about a future post that is coming soon.

I took many pictures of this pond with no name, but most of them came out too bright and washed out for some reason. It's the first time I've ever had this problem with my phone camera. You can see that even this picture above is a little brighter than the others.

Still, I wanted to show you more of this pond, but the video will have to be what represents it the best this time. As I said before, I will be back. And I'll get a few pictures from other directions when I do come back.

This sign is the only indication that you're entering a special place. If I remember right there's a bigger sign at the other end of the place. I'll show you that end sometime soon I think. Deer Creek must be named after an actual creek. I'll need to find that and get a few pictures too.

I almost didn't include the picture of the sign, but I remembered at the last minute that it belonged here. And I was supposed to have this post up yesterday, but with all of my recent activity, I'm still trying to find the time to write these posts. It does all work out in the end though, and here is the post. I'll talk to you later.

An Early Morning View Of Nature

Do these pictures look nice? I'm not really sure. To me, they look like chaos. I've always hesitated on sharing pictures like these because of this. But I have them for you today because I realized that much of nature seems like chaos. A beautiful chaos.

There's so much green and brown in these pictures. And there's no real defined subject point to look at. You just kind of look everywhere. Maybe there is a kind of beauty in the chaos. Nature itself is beautiful, and this is nature if nothing else.

I took these pictures on another early morning walk around town. The light is a little dim because the sun was just coming up. The whole world seemed alive with nature activity. There were birds singing everywhere. And I saw little movements all around me.

The smell of the world seems so fresh this early in the morning. there is a dampness to the air as well. It almost feels like a lingering rain, but the sunlight takes that feeling away too. There may not be a better feeling to the world than at this time of day. Everything is new and waking up.

And now I have a new episode of Rat TV for you. It's nothing fancy because I have a new video editor which I haven't learned yet. So no fancy graphics to interrupt the video this time. It's just a video of the morning.

The real reason I made the video was for you to hear what I heard. You can see what I show in the pictures, but the video has sound as well. The sound is the important thing here. Don't worry, the video lasts for only about thirty seconds. So you won't have to suffer through a long movie. You'll like this because it's just soothing nature sounds.

Maybe one of these next times we'll take a closer look at some of these plants. I like looking at them, but I have trouble writing about them. So I'll have to come up with something at least a little bit interesting to say. But who knows? Maybe I'll come across a skunk or something before that.

So we come to the end of another everyday adventure. My little adventures aren't meant to blow you away. They're just here to give you a small pleasant feeling. That's what nature is for. And the main thing to remember is that everyone can experience this. I'll talk to you later.

The Old Man Of The Forest

I'd like to introduce you to Freeman. Freeman appears to be a very old squirrel of the fox variety. I guess you could say that he's the old man of the forest. He still gets around pretty well for an old man, but the signs of his age are still there nonetheless.

If you take a very close look just above his eyes you can see that the hair is just a little more gray than other fox squirrels might be. The rest of his fur also seems to be tinged with a little gray. His face has a bit of a weathered look that you might also find in very old human males.

Here's a special episode of Rat TV that features Freeman the wise old squirrel. He may not get around as well as some of the youngsters, but you'd never know it, you young whippersnapper! Videos can sometimes give us a better insight into these animals of the forest, especially the standouts like Freeman.

Take a look right behind his ears there. That is a patch of gray fur that Freeman is sporting. Also look at the top of his back and all over his tail. You can see a touch of gray all over him. I wonder how old this guy really is.

Take a look at Freeman's bent ears. I've seen old men with ears that look just like that. Sometimes these guys seem grumpy, but they really aren't. Stop and listen to what they have to say some time. They know a lot more than you do. A squirrel like Freeman could tell you how everything works.

Oh wait, I think he sees me! Hey there little guy...

"Hey there, you kid! Get off my lawn! ...Ah, wait a minute. Did I ever tell you about the time me and my brother took on five, no six, yup six other squirrels? They got too close to our tree and started running their mouths. I knocked out every last one of them, and my brother threw them in the ditch. It was one of the best times..."

Good old Freeman. I could listen to his stories for hours, but right now it's time to go. I'll talk to you later.

"Hey, you youngsters! Wash your ears or potatoes will start to grow from them!"

The Friendly Little Red Squirrel

#wildlife #pictures I'm revisiting an older post with a friendly little squirrel I found at one of the larger nature parks near me. I was known for my squirrel posts back around this time. Read on and you'll see that there's a reason this particular squirrel was so friendly.

Why is this little Red Squirrel standing there so expectantly? It saw humans on this busy park walkway and thought there would be a free meal of piles and piles of sunflower seeds. And did the little squirrel get that expected meal? Yes, but not from me.

It seems that the squirrels at this section of Kensington Metropark are fed regularly by the humans that walk by. Not only the squirrels, but chipmunks and birds are fed as well. So you might guess what kind of behavior we get to see out of these normally wild creatures.

This is what you get. These creatures have decided that humans are a good thing to have around. They come running right up when they see someone slow down on the trail at this section. They know exactly what kind of human behavior to watch for.

There were at least a dozen animals that came right up to me and begged for food. This squirrel was just one of several other red squirrels that came right up to me, begging at my feet. The Chipmunks were just as bold. There was at least one Nuthatch that wanted in on the action as well, hopping along on the ground with the others.

There are so many of these animals, and some waited so patiently, that I have plenty of video for you from this adventure. So this episode of Rat TV is of a chubby little red squirrel that kept coming right up to me begging and pleading for seeds.

There are more videos, of course. One of which is the Cool Nature Video over at Nature Center Magazine today. The squirrels in that video aren't peaceful and happy at all. No, they are very angry little monsters. They won't tolerate any other animals coming near them, growling at all that are near. They even get angry at one another. They actually begin brawling right there on the sidewalk!

But here's little chubby again, happily coming over to hopefully beg for seeds. This little squirrel is either pregnant or is just getting more than its share of seeds that are thrown down. You can see what I'm talking about more clearly in the video. It is a cute little girl though. I like squirrels.

I got a lot of video this time, maybe more than even the pictures. There were just so many animals here, and they were all moving around so fast. Fast is usually easy for me, but not when the animals are running around my feet like bratty little children. The bratty kind are the best, you know. I'll talk to you later.


Nature Center Magazine - Come see a video game style brawl, with squirrels! Watch as the champion takes on all challengers in this knock down drag out fight to the finish! LLLet's Get Ready To Squirrelll!!!

Walking With A Herd Of Bison

I told you a few posts ago that I was on a quest to find a herd of bison and a herd of rabbits. Well, here's the herd of bison. I'm still hunting for the rabbits. I'll get them soon enough. The only problem is that I don't think rabbits gather in groups. So let's talk about these bison.

From time to time I do some things that would be considered strange or dangerous to some people. I did indeed get this close to these bison. I was actually even closer than this. Let me tell you, these are huge animals. They make cows look small. You don't want to mess with them. They're not tame and they can get angry very quickly.

See that bison in the front there? Look at that lighter area toward the back. That's its baby standing there nursing. There are a few little ones in this herd. They're hard to see in this tall grass, so watch for that lighter color.

I told you in that earlier post that I might even get a picture of me riding one of them. The only problem is that I didn't have any way to get the picture because I was all alone. Who was going to take the picture? So maybe next time.

I didn't mention while we were on the first picture about the houses you can see in the distance. I wasn't exactly out in the wilderness here. But this is a bit of a wild area with the bison here. The reason I was able to get so close was because they don't exactly have miles to roam. The bison are still very wild and very dangerous.

Now we come to the part I really promised you. I have a new episode of Rat TV, a video of this herd of bison. As usual I kept it short so you don't have to suffer through a long video that you may not want to watch. But you do get a better idea of what the herd looks like, and you get to imagine just how close I was to them.

I took a few pictures from a little ways back from the herd. I wanted to get more of these huge animals in the shot. You can see that it's not the whole herd, but it gives you a better idea of their distribution. maybe there are bigger herds, but this was a good sized one.

I didn't take many pictures of the bison. I usually take lots. This time I thought it might be a better idea to get in there and do what I had to do and then get out. I was really standing there. I wasn't in a vehicle with protection or anything like that. I don't recommend anybody else try that. I will say that I was perfectly safe though.

So now that I've met this one goal, what can I do next? How can I top this? No, I haven't gotten that herd of rabbits yet. So what comes next? I know what it is, but I haven't done it yet. I won't reveal what it is here, but I hope to have it in my next post. See you then. And I'll talk to you later.

Finally Some Fun

I was finally able to get back out to a nature park. It was a short visit, but I was at least able to be there. This time I visited Five Ridge Prairie Preserve. This is a huge park that I have visited before. I went here for a few reasons I'll tell you about.

This park is always open, which is the main reason I went here. It's so much easier to go to a park when I have enough time to explore it properly. I love that other one, but it closes in the middle of the afternoon.

If not for the big hills this would be my favorite park by far. It is the most isolated park I have ever been to. There is almost always no one else here. I like that. And it is so big that many people have gotten lost and had to have the authorities come and search for them. I actually consider that to be kind of a plus in a strange way.

This time I only went a little way up the first trail. Right now my back still isn't healthy enough to go very far. Maybe if I keep coming back here I can get back to my old self where I could hike for miles and miles.

I even have a new episode of Rat TV for you this time. It's been a long time since my last one. This is a very short video, under thirty seconds. I kept it short so as not to torture you. I did it so you could hear the same nature sounds I was hearing. It was beautiful.

I can tell you about one major thing I like about being here as opposed to my nature parks back in Michigan. The sound. When I was at my old nature parks I constantly heard the background noise of human vehicle traffic. It kind of ruined the overall experience. Here there is only nature.

Part of the reason my visit here was short though was the bugs. As soon as I got on the trail the bugs swarmed me badly. You can hear them in the video. It was so bad that I couldn't really stop and enjoy the experience of being there. Every time I stopped to take a picture those bugs would land all over me.

I've never liked bugs, but I've been able to deal with them before. I'll deal with them in my future adventures here and elsewhere. At least there weren't many mosquitoes among the swarms. I still had a wonderful time, and I'm excited to go again soon.

I'm going to try something revolutionary here starting with this post. I'm going to try posting every few days again instead of every few weeks. When I started I was posting every day. That old car accident put a stop to all of that. But I'm planning on visiting the nature parks much more now, even if it's only in the evenings.

If I'm going to visit the nature parks so often I'm going to have much more to share. I don't want all of my new stuff to fall by the wayside. So I'll be here every few days or so even if my readers can't keep up. That'll be kind of fun, having more here than you can read. It's been awhile.

With only posting every few weeks I sometimes forget why I started this blog. It was to motivate myself to go hiking. The hiking then made the blog fun. There was a new adventure every day. That was fun. And that's what it's all about. Talk to you later.

Pelicans In Nebraska

I decided to take a trip down to DeSoto National Wildlife Refuge in Iowa and Nebraska, at the recommendation of Out On The Prarie, and I found these two American White Pelicans. I never knew I might find pelicans in a place like Nebraska. The signs said I was in Nebraska. I thought pelicans only lived near the ocean.

The funny thing is that I knew exactly what they were as soon as I saw them. I guess there's no mistaking what a pelican looks like. Of course I had to check later just to make sure, but my guide confirmed that they were indeed pelicans.

I took a lot of pictures, but most of them came out blurry. I think it was the distance combined with their white color that made so many pictures come out so bad. I was glad when I saw that at least a few came out okay. These would have been some of the best anyway.

And now for my newest episode of Rat TV. I had to wait to get this video uploaded to Youtube before I could write this post. I didn't want to leave it out. You don't get the best look at the pelicans, but the video is clear and steady, and it's not bad. They just didn't pose very well.

This was the first picture I took of them. You can see that they weren't very interested in posing for the camera. It would have been nice if they would have stood up nice and straight for the camera, but I guess you can't get everything that you want. I'm just glad I got these pictures.

I probably could have gotten a little bit closer, but I was afraid they would leave if they saw me lurking around. Maybe I would have gotten a few good pictures of them in flight, but I didn't want to risk it. And besides, it wouldn't have been nice to disturb them. I'll talk to you later.

Chasing Butterflies

The past couple of weeks have been full of dealing with doctors for me. I haven't had much time to think about anything else, and it's not quite over. I'm trying to get at least a few small visits out to nature here and there. I found this butterfly on one of those little visits.

I don't know that I have much to say about the butterfly. I haven't had time to check and see what kind it is, but it does look familiar. I've posted about these little guys before and I think I've identified those back then. I'll tell you just what it is next time I get one.

I did at least remember to get a little video of the butterfly, done in Super Ratty Shaky Cam mode. If you watch it on Youtube you can view it in whatever quality you want. I'm not sure how good the quality is on here. I'm hoping it's set on low so everyone can see it.

On days like the one with this buttefly encounter I wish I could stay out there forever. I keep quickly remembering that I have other unpleasant things I have to do though. I stood and watched the river behind this butterfly for a long time. It was heaven.

I was chasing butterflies from plant to plant. Most of them were too fast for me. I got the video because the pictures were getting hard. The video did a good job of keeping up though. I'll have to take a look at my other butterfly pictures to see if there's anything that's good enough for another post. I'll have to have at least a small story for it though. I'll talk to you later.

A Bigger View Of The Falls

I'm back with a rare weekend post. This is another one from Falls Park in Sioux Falls. This time I have a little bigger view of the falls for you. I have two pictures and a video. The pictures give you a still version of what you will find in the video in case you don't want to sit through the video.

Something I didn't do when I visited these falls last summer was to go into the building at thye far end of the park. It was clearly open for visitors, but I had my dog with me so I couldn't go in. I left Isabella behind this time for just that reason.

I felt really guilty leaving er behind, but I can't bring her along for every trip. The only other way to be able to go into the building would be to leave her in the truck by herself, and I would feel worse about that than just leaving her at home where she's comfortable and she feels safe. So at home she had to stay.

So I was able to go into the building. I didn't know what to expect, but it turned out to be pretty good. What I found in there was a shop where they sold t-shirts, postcards, and all sorts of other trinkets for the park. In other words, my kind of stuff!

I looked around for a bit until I got to the t-shirts. I try to buy at least one t-shirt from each place I visit. I noticed that they were only $10 at this place so I bought two of them. Now I have two more t-shirts to add to the million that I've collected.

So this episode of Rat TV shows the bigger view of the falls. Everything is white from the snow. There really is only enough snow here to make everything white. It's actually more than where I live because there are o0nly white patches around me.

In an unrelated event, it's been very windy around home for the past few days. I have two big trees right in front of my house. Guess what happened. That's right. A big branch from one of the trees broke and fell right on my roof. Now I have to figure out a way to get it off, and I'll probably have to trim the tree a bit so nothing like this happens again. Fun fun fun.

Okay, I have a lot more good pictures from Falls Park, but they're kind of unrelated to the videos I've already posted. I may do another post with just them, but I may skip them altogether. I'm not sure yet. One way or another I'll have a new post in a couple of days. I'll talk to you later.