Birding and Hiking the Gunpowder River

A post for my Mosaic Monday and That's My World and a link to my you tube Mountain laurels along the trail

This week hubby and I hiked down the trail to the Gunpowder River to see the mountain laurels in bloom. The trail along the river has an amazing amount of white and pink  mountain laurels blooming. The weather was great for hiking and we sat and watched some kayakers playing around in the white water area of the river. It is also a river popular with the trout fishermen and people tubing.

I was also able to check out the birds along the river. I saw a beautiful Scarlet Tanager high in the tree tops. Acadian Flycatchers were all around and I am pretty sure I heard a Prothonotary Warbler.  One of the birds that popped up close to me was the Louisiana Waterthrush. This bird likes to nest in woodlands near rivers or fast moving streams. As you can see it has pinkish legs and a wide white supercilium. Which to me looks just like an eyebrow.

Goldie Girl got to play in the river and cool off.

The mountain laurel was blooming beautifully, I really loved the pink ones.

To see more great photos and mosaics please visit Mary's Mosaic Monday  and That's My World  thanks to Mary of Little Red House and to the group of hosts at That's My World : Sylvia, Wren, Sandy and Klaus.

Also thanks for visiting my post and I wish everyone a great week.

Birding and Hiking Shenandoah Nat'l Park

For Camera Critters  and Scenic Sunday I have a post on some of the wildlife and scenery we saw at Shenandoah Nat'l Park last weekend.

Last Sunday hubby and I went on a daytrip to Shenandoah National Park. I love driving on the Skyline Drive, hiking the trails and looking for birds. It was a birdie day. I heard and saw lots of Redstarts, Scarlet Tanagers, Flycatchers, Phoebes and there were lots of Towhees and a Veery.

We also saw our first wild turkey along the Skyline drive and some deer along the drive and on the trail we hiked.

  A view of the Applachian mountain ranges from the Skyline drive ovelook.

Deer on the Limberlost trail

An unknown butterfly on the trail

 There were many Indigo Buntings singing along the trail and along the Skyline Drive

An overlook of the Shenandoah valley from the Appalachian trail.

I believe this is a Veery seen along a stretch of the Appalachian trail we hiked.

  Some of the wildflowers seen along the Limberlost trail. I think they are wild Columbine?

To see Scenic photos from around the world visit Scenic Sunday   and more wonderful and cute critters please visit Misty Dawn's Camera Critters.  Thanks to the Holleys of Scenic Sunday and to Misty for hosting this fun memes and thanks for stopping by my blog to see my post.

Barred Owl

For this weeks World Bird Wednesday  and Nature Notes I am posting on the Barred owl hubby and I saw on a walk at Riley's Lock. The Potomac River and the C&O canal trail has been a great place for me to see birds. During this walk we saw two Barred owls together. One flew away but one stayed in a tree near the trail and watched us. We saw many other species of birds on our walk but the owl was my favorite sighting.


The Barred Owl is seen in  mixed woodlands and swamp forest. They prey on insects, vertebrates and amphibians.  Their call sounds a lot like "who cooks for you" .

The photo above shows the owl looking down, we watched as smaller birds were determined to make the owl leave and were trying to dive bomb him or her.

To see more great birds please visit Springman's World Bird Wednesday  and Michelle's  Nature Notes thanks to Springman  and Michelle for hosting and thanks for stopping by to see my post.

A few yardbirds

For this weeks Camera Critters I have a few of my yardbirds. Some are just passing thru and some are here nesting.

The bluebirds are one of my favorite yardbirds and probably the first bird that got me interested in birding. Sometimes I can see them year round and sometimes they leave and come back to build their nest.

The Ruby Throated hummingbird look pretty funky.

The Indigo Bunting is one of my summer birds. Summer birds are breeders here in Maryland and have a nest nearby.

The American Goldfinches are here year round but the males turn a duller color in the winter. They look beautiful in the summer.

The female Rose Brested Grosbeak was just passing thru to her nesting habitat. She decided she needed a quick fix of bird seed to keep her going.

I hope you enjoyed my yardbirds and to see more wonderful critters please visit

Misty Dawn's Camera Critters.  Thanks to Misty for hosting and thank you for stopping by to see my post.

 I hope you all have a great weekend.

SWF and Chimney Swifts

For my Skywatch Friday

Thanks to Jeanne, one of my birding friends this weekend I added the Chimney Swift to my life list. Jeanne told me that the Chimney Swifts were seen flying in and around a church steeple in New Freedom, Pa. New Freedom is just a short drive from my house since I live close to the Md-Pa line.  So hubby and I took a ride to our favorite ice cream place called Bonkey's in New Freedom which just happens to be just down the street from the church. 

I was able to watch my lifer the Chimeny Swift flying around the skies above my car while I was parked near the church eating my ice cream cone. It was sad to see that the church had put up wire fence or netting around their steeple. I guess the birds are not wanted inside their steeple.

The chimney swifts fly around fast like the swallows and they remind me of bats. I wasn't able to see them fly into the steeple but I did see them flying around the neighborhood. Here is a link to the Wikipedia Chimney Swifts so you can see what they look like up close. They were flying much too fast for me to get a close up.

Next, I have some shots of the sunset and a pretty sky on the way home from seeing the Chimney Swifts.

A sundog

I hope you enjoyed my skywatch and if you are ever near New Freedom, Pa you should try Bonkey's homemade icecream.  To see more beautiful skies from all around the world click here Skywatch Friday.  Thanks to the host of Skywatch: Sylvia, Sandy, Wren and Klaus.  Also, thank you for visiting my post and blog, I hope you have a great weekend.