Back To The Nature Trails

I needed to start getting back out visiting nature again, but I think I needed to get back to it in kind of a small way. I wanted to visit some nature trails with that idea, so the obvious solution was a small nature park that was also close by. Dunham Prairie Preserve is perfect for that.

I've decided that I need to visit a good nature park more routinely, so I'm going to be visiting this one at least every few days from now on. That's how I used to do things when I went on my little everyday adventures back in Michigan. It was the best time I ever had with nature.

I would visit those old parks just about every day, but I've never done the same thing since I've been here in Iowa. I guess I never gave this park a chance. I liked the park at first, but then I quickly decided for some reason that there wasn't much to see here. Maybe I just missed my old parks.

At my old parks I used to see lots of wildlife, but not so much here. But I got to thinking recently that I didn't see many animals at those old parks until I was visiting them for awhile. Maybe those animals had gotten used to me and they weren't as afraid as before. Maybe it can be the same here too.

Even if I never see much wildlife here I might learn other interesting things about this place. I've never considered knowledge about plants one of my strong points, but I was getting pretty good with the plants at those other parks. There's lots of plants here to see.

I've had a theory that out here in the country the animals have more places to hide than they did in the city where my old parks were. Maybe that's why I don't see as much at my new parks. But maybe I'm wrong. I won't know until I really try to visit a park more often.

One of the features I liked about this park from the start is this bridge. It's not much of a bridge, but I still like it. Any bridge is good to me. I don't know how many times I've written about my love for all bridges. A bridge in the middle of the woods is my favorite.

This is all my way of trying to get my health and my pleasure of nature back. When I lived in the city nature parks were like a refuge in the middle of all of that concrete. Now they are more of the same of right where I live. I don't need the refuge as much, but I do need that wonderful feeling that walking through a nature park all alone always gives me.

I often find when I'm home I get into a routine of doing nothing. I need to be out with nature seeing the sights and hearing the wonderful sounds. And a good long hike is great for the muscles. The whole experience leaves me with the best all around feeling when I get back home.

I'll be visiting this park very often from now on. I'll do my best to show you different things with each post from there. Maybe I'll post a little more often again too. After a little while I should begin to learn a few more interesting things about the place. And besides, my dog really needs the exercise. I'll talk to you later.

A Couple Of Woodpeckers

It's been a little too long again since my last post. I've been stuck in the house until I start to feel a bit better so I don't have much to post about. I didn't intend to take so long, but it gets hard when I'm cooped up and not really able to get excited about seeing nature in action.

I still have some things I've seen though, like these two woodpeckers, even though these pictures are actually from several months ago. At first glance they may look like two of the same kind of bird, but look again. The one on the right is much bigger than the bird on the left.

The little bird on the left is the same kind of Downy Woodpecker that I've posted before several times. The bigger bird on the right is her relative, a male Hairy Woodpecker.

The similarities between these birds are very interesting. They both look almost the same except for their size. Both male versions have that red band on the back of their head. The females don't have that. The downy here is a female and the hairy is a male.

There are differences though. As I've said, the hairy woodpecker is much bigger than the downy. The most noticeable difference after that is the length of the beaks. The downy woodpecker has a much shorter beak in relation to its head.

The bigger hairy woodpecker's beak is about the same length as its head, while the downy woodpecker's beak is very short in comparison. That's the best way to tell which one you are seeing when they are not together like in my pictures.

The strange distortions in my pictures is actually dog slobber on the window I took the pictures through. The dog gets kind of excited watching the birds. I have to constantly clean the window.

Maybe you don't consider this last picture that good, but I love it. It shows the downy woodpecker flying away. I love capturing stuff like that, no matter how it comes out.

I actually began writing this post about a week ago. I had to stop because I just wasn't feeling very good. I think I'm finally beginning to get better now, so I'm going to make an effort to start writing my posts a little sooner again.

There's a small nature park up the road that I'm going to visit quite a bit to get back into going out again. I'm hoping that if I visit it often enough that I'll begin to see some interesting stuff that I otherwise would miss. That's how I did things years ago and it worked out very well. I hope my next post is from that place. I'll talk to you later.