Saturday's Critters # 183

Welcome to Saturday's Critters!

Happy Father's Day to all the Dads!

If you love critters 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!

Another common bird we saw in Washington State is the Stellar's Jay. I think they are beautiful. These images were on a day we transferred from the Mt Rainier Park area to Anacortes, Washington.

This shop called Recycled Spirits of Iron off on Rt 706 in Ashford Washington. The iron sculptures are huge, there were  horses, a giraffe, rooster and eagle. The sculptures were all very cool. I took these photos from the road and our car. 

A larger image of the iron sculpted giraffe.

On our drive to Anacortes we stopped at the park below called Bay View State Park on the Padilla Bay. I was amazed at how many Great Blue Herons were seen hanging out in the bay. The tide must have been low at this time.  The photo below looks better after you click for a larger image. 

I believe these are Western Grebe's below, if I am wrong please let me know.

For Tom's party ...a barn across the bay.
Tom's The Barn Collective  Thanks to Tom for hosting.

My Linky
I appreciate and thank everyone who links up their post and for all the wonderful comments! I hope you enjoy my post and photos too!

Here is a list of my linky parties;
Also visit:  I'd-Rather-B-Birdin. Thanks to the gracious host: Anni.

Tom's The Barn Collective  Thanks to Tom for hosting.


Happy Saturday, enjoy your weekend!

Saturday's Critters #182

Welcome to Saturday's Critters!

If you love critters 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!

I am so behind in sharing photos, I have months of Florida photos, some from home and most recently from our Washington state trip. I will be flip-flopping all around with photos. These are from our 1st day in Washington state, we visited Mount Rainer National Park.

A Gray Jay  below was seen at one of the park's overlook parking lots.

The Varied Thrush is one of my favorite Washington birds, I love it's colors and markings.

The Northern Flicker.  In the western states, they are known as the Red-shafted Northern Flicker. The east coast has the Yellow-shafted Northern Flicker.

A Stellar Jay, commonly seen in Washington State.

We stayed at a B&B Mountain Meadows Inn at Ashford Washington. We were only 7miles from the park entrance.  The elk below were seen near a farm along side of the main road.

Sharing a barn for Tom's The Barn Collective  , I saw this while walking a trail behind the barn from a local Ashford park.

My linky

I appreciate and thank everyone who links up their post and for all the wonderful comments! I hope you enjoy my post and photos too!

Here is a list of my linky parties;
Also visit:  I'd-Rather-B-Birdin. Thanks to the gracious host: Anni.

Tom's The Barn Collective  Thanks to Tom for hosting.


Happy Saturday, enjoy your weekend!  

Saturday's Critters #42

Saturday's Critters #42


Happy weekend and welcome to Saturday's Critters! I am sharing some of the birds and critter seen during our Colorado vacation.. We were lucky to see the female moose and her young a few times..The Marmots were seen a few times during our rides back and forth thru the park. The Stellar's Jay were a common bird seen all over the place..

The Stellar's Jay.

Female Moose and calf.

The Marmot.

Thanks to Tex, I was able to add this link up button..

<a href="http://viewingnaturewitheileen.blogspot.com/"><img src=" https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3915/15299083201_9709303697_m.jpg" width="185" height="240"></a>

I hope you enjoyed my Jay and the critters.. As always thanks for visiting my post!

An InLinkz Link-up

 Thank you for linking up to the critter party. I appreciate the visits, comments and the support of my blogging friends................... Have a happy weekend!


To see more beautiful birds and cute critters, check out these two memes below.

Please visit:  I'd-Rather-B-Birdin. Thanks to the gracious host: Anni of I'd Rather-B-birdin. Also, sharing with Camera Critters. Thanks to Misty for hosting.

Jays,Crows & Kin

I am linking up with Wild Bird Wednesday and Nature Notes


I am diving into my archives for this post which includes the Jays and Kin in the Corvidae family..Some photos of the Blue Jay are from my backyard and other shots are from my travels.

The two shots above are from my backyard. The Blue Jay is a regular year round visitor in  my yard.  It loves peanuts in and out of the shell. They are loud and always announce their presence on my deck. They are able to imitate a hawk sound so well it really fools me and my little birds.

The Stellar Jay was a common sight during our Washington State travels.. It has a sooty black head and crest, blue wings and tail.

Sorry, for the quality of this shot above but it is the only one I could find of the Gray Jay I was while traveling around Wyoming and Montana.  I need to do some checking on my back up files for a better shot of the Gray Jay. It is a beautiful bird, it is dark gray above and pale gray below. This Jay does NOT have a crest.

The Clark's Nutcracker was seen at Bryce National Park. This bird has a long bill, gray body with black wings.

 And the (Corvidae) Corvid family also includes the following

 The Common Raven has a heavy bill, long wings and tail. The Raven seems to be a more common sight in the western part of the USA.

These Ravens were seen in the Bryce Nat'l Park in Utah.

The Black-billed Magpie was a common bird seen in Yellowstone Nat'l Park. They were usually hanging around the parking lots. They have a black head and breast, white belly and an elegant long tail.

 The Corvid family includes a list of Crows. Above is the American Crow seen in my backyard. The American Crow is overall black, also has a heavy bill, broad wings shorter than the Raven. Somewhere I may have a shot of the Fish Crow seen during my travels.. I wish I had labeled my older photos, to save a lot of searching. 

I am missing a few or more Jays for my lifer list.. Some day it will be nice to see some of the other Jays like the: Brown Jay, Pinyon Jay, Mexican Jay and my favorite the Green Jay.  There are also three Scrub Jays: the Western Scrub Jay, Island Scrub Jay and one I have seen the Florida Scrub Jay. Did you know there were so many Jays?

Thanks for stopping by my post and for all the nice comments.

Join in and post your birdies and to see more beautiful and wonderful bird photos please visit:
 Stewart's Wild Bird Wednesday and Michelle's  Nature Notes.  Thanks to our host Michelle our host Stewart.  Happy Birding and have a wonderful week!

SWF>>>Oregon

I am linking up my Oregon skies with Nature Notes and Skywatch Friday

These are some shots during our visit to the Columbia River, the Gorge and another waterfall at the Gorge. We stopped at various overlooks along the Columbia Gorge. At one of the overlooks we saw the sun shining beautifully on the Vista House.

 

Above is a pretty view of the sky, river and the Columbia Gorge Vista House.

Above, hubby made this trip up the Oneonta Gorge to see another waterfalls. The trail to the waterfalls was a watery one. To see the Oneonta Falls, hubby had to first climb over a big log jam and then walk up the stream thru this narrow gorge. He said at times the water was up to his waste and he was holding my spare camera over his head in a backpack.

 

Above is the Oneonta Waterfalls. Hubby took this hike alone and I stayed  near the parking lot looking for birds. Let just say I tried to get some bird photos, luckily I saw them enough to id some before they took off.

I tried so hard to catch some of the swallows  flying above me at the Gorge trailhead. I am not sure if they were Cliff Swallows or another species of swallows or maybe they were swifts. At times I thought they landed on the cliff walls. They flew fast, I did have fun watching them zoom all around me.

This was my attempt at trying to get a photo of the Stellar's Jay. You can see a blue flash.

 

LOL,  seriously I really tried getting some good Oregon bird shots. This was a Cedar Waxwing showing off his pretty backside and tailfeathers. 

The sky looked threatening but it did not rain. 

The sun tried to shine and had a small opening before setting behind the clouds for the evening. We stayed near the Columbia River for three days before heading to the Oregon Coast. During our week stay in Oregon I took over 1600 photos and that does not include photos I took at my SIL's wedding in Washington state.

To see more pretty Nature Scenes and skies please visit : Nature Notes  and Skywatch Friday

Thanks to Michelle the host of Nature Notes and to host of Skywatch: Sylvia and Sandy.  Thanks for stopping by to see my post. I hope the rest of the week and weekend is a safe and happy one for everyone.