Saturday's Critters #242

Welcome to Saturday's Critters!

If you love all God's creatures like I do and also like to blog about them and take critter photos this is where you can share your critter post. Link up your post and share your critters, join in with my critter party ! You can share any kind of critters the real ones, pretend ones, statues and paintings, a new or old post!

These are my critters for today's critter post. On the way home from our local bike trail we road past this farm with two donkeys and two horses.  I had to stop and take some photos, I love donkeys.

My hubby met and talked with an older local man while hiking on our local fire road trail, the man  told hubby about another eagle's nest nearby that we did not know about.  So July 18th we hiked this fire road to find the eagle nest. It was too late to see the eagles but now we know where the nest is for next year. We have lived here almost 29 years and we still have not hiked all the local fire roads.

While checking out the Eagle nest, I noticed  a duck far away floating in the lake just under the nest, it turned out to be a Red-breasted Merganser.  This bird is rare to be seen in Maryland this time of the year. Are the winter birds already on the move?

I appreciate and thank everyone who links up their post and for all the wonderful comments !

Here is a list of my linky parties;

Also visit:  I'd-Rather-B-Birdin. Thanks to the gracious host: Anni.

Happy Saturday, enjoy your weekend!

Great Smoky Mountains Nat'l Park

I am sharing some of our birds, critters and scenes from the Great Smoky Mountains Nat'l Park  for Green Day and Camera Critters and I'd-Rather-B-Birdin.

 I did not have much luck birding in the Smokies, some of the common birds I saw were the Dark-eyed Junco and lots of Wild Turkeys. I could hear Blue Jays, American Crows, Turkeys Vultures,  unknown Warblers, Titmouse, Chickadees and Nuthatches but none of them wanted their photo taken. In the creek near our hotel and town  I saw some Mallard Ducks.

 Above are shots of the Grotto Falls, A Dark-eyed Junco, Fall colors, Cades Cove horses, Wild Turkey, behind Grotto Falls, Smoky Mountain colors, deer, Cades Cove.



On our first full day, hubby and I drove to the Roaring Fork Motor Drive and headed for the parking lot for the Grotto Falls before it got too crowded. At the beginning of the drive we saw a black bear, I did manage a blurry photo before the park ranger clapped it away. We did the 2.6 mile roundtrip hike to the waterfall. I even walked behind the waterfall, a first for me after many different waterfall visits.

I was checking out the color along the Grotto Falls trail.

Later in the day we headed to the Cades Cove drive, here we saw horses, wild turkeys and some deer.  It was very crowded and took a while to do the 11 miles of the motor tour.

Some of the pretty Smoky Mountain colors.

Since, the birds were hiding from me and my camera I decided to take some shots of the horses. They are pretty.

I was happy hearing and seeing the birds moving quickly all along this Grotto Falls trail. It was very birdy trail, just not a good day for taking bird photos.  I hope you enjoyed hiking to the waterfall with me and seeing the Cades Cove Horses.


To see more beautiful photos and cute critters please visit: Green Day  and Camera Critters and I'd-Rather-B-Birdin. Thanks to the gracious host Fiona of Green Day, Misty Dawn of Camera Critters and to Anni of I'd Rather-B-birdin.  Thanks for visiting my blog and post. I wish everyone a very safe and happy weekend.

Some Shenandoah birds and critters

I am linking up with one of my favorite meme's Camera Critters. I have always been an animal lover.....from dogs, cats, birds, turtles and frogs, And the big critters too horses, cows, deer and bears. It is wonderful to see these critters and enjoy them.

These are some shots from our Shenandoah Nat'l Park trip on June 2nd.   We started somewhat early on my favorite Limberlost trail by 9:30am. It is a great trail to see some birds closeup in the underbrush. I was happy to be seeing lots of Redstarts, Towhees, Robins and Blue-headed Vireo...I should start carrying a notebook with me to keep a list of the birds I see. I know I saw and heard more birds but I can not remember them all, a notepad and pen is important for the next time.

 My only shot of the Blue-headed Vireo. This Vireo has a blue head, white throat and a greenish back. The sides are washed with yellow-olive and also has strong wingbars.


As we walked along the trail I stopped every once in awhile looking for birds, I looked up the hill and turned to hubby and said look there is a black bear. He was amazed at how calm I was just turning and saying quietly that there was a black bear. I was really excited it was only the second time we have even seen a bear while walking on a Shenandoah trail. We have been there hundreds of times too. We stood and watched the bear until it was out of sight, very cool.

So we continued walking along the trail hoping to see the bear cross over the trail. no luck there. So I went back to looking and listening to the birds.

 We heard a lot of Eastern Towhees, this female Eastern Towhee was the only one that came out into the open. She did not seem to care that we stood and watched her. We finished the loop trail and headed back to our car, we were ready to head down to the Big Meadows store for some lunch.

 At the parking lot we saw this group of riders on their horses. You can arrange to take a trail ride at Shenandoah, something we never seemed to have time for, we usually prefer to hike.

If you want to know where your winter birds go in the summer we saw lots of Dark-eyed Juncos near the camp store. We ate our lunch and headed back onto the Skyline Drive for our next hike, it was a new one for us called the Upper Hawksbill. It is the highest part of the Skyline Drive and the views were beautiful. Back in our car  and driving on the Skyline Drive we came across our second bear sighting. This one was just walking along side the road.

I have always enjoyed seeing bears, I just love them. This was a first time we had the bear to ourselves. No other cars came around so we were able to stop and watch the bear for awhile without more cars coming to scare it away. I believe we were still in the middle section of the Skyline Drive and heading home when seeing the second bear. We still had the north section of the drive to go. We stopped at some overlooks and we were still looking for deers and bears on the north section before heading out of the park.

Our next sighting was seeing this cute fawn and its momma along the road. I stopped my car to watch them for awhile until a bike rider came along and they ran away into the woods.

Almost out of the park and close to the entrance gate another black bear ran across the road right in front of my car and went right into the woods. It was moving quickly but we still stopped and watched till it disappeared into the woods. Wow, I could not believe we had sighted three different black bears. There are times we go and do not see one, so I consider myself really lucky on this trip.

I hope you enjoyed my Shenandoah critters and to see more beautiful and cute critters please visit Camera Critters . Thanks to Misty Dawn for hosting and thank you for stopping by to see my post. I wish everyone a safe and HAPPY weekend. Also Happy Birding!!

Critters from the NCR trail

I saved some of my NCR critter photos for Camera Critters

During our walk on the NCR trail we stopped and watched this Great blue Heron, the chickens are from a nearby house. They seem to roam free around the trail. We also shared the trail with some locals riding their horses on the trail. And of course Goldie Girl got to go on the walk with us.

Goldie Girl always seems to get her leash wrapped around her paws, we stopped to check out the stream and fix her leash. The stream is always a good place to see a Kingfisher.

A group of the chickens taking a walk on the trail. Goldie Girl is not so sure what to make of these chickens. But, they did not see to mind Goldie Girl or having us nearby.

We stepped aside to let the horseback riders go by, Goldie Girl likes to see these big critters go by.

I hope you enjoyed my critter post and to see more wonderful critters please visit Misty Dawn's Camera Critters.  Thanks to Misty for hosting and thanks for stopping by to see my post. Happy Weekend!


To see more cute critters check out Camera Critters