What Are You?

Since it was a sunny day, I decided to walk up to one of the lakes and see if the herons were around. To my delight, the first thing I saw was the black-crowned night heron (see extra) sitting so nicely, waiting for his photo shoot. He quickly got tired of that and flew off. I was quite pleased, thinking, "blip in the bag for today".

I wandered a bit farther down the lake. The geese and coots were upset that I was disturbing their morning siesta. A lot of honking was going on and then I heard something that I did not recognize. It was a rather large bird in a tree, chattering loudly. Got a few shots, but with the tangle of limbs it wasn't clear what kind it was. I watched a while longer and it rewarded my patience by landing on top of a dead palm tree.

Oh, my! I do believe you are a belted kingfisher! I have never seen one of these before today. My heart was going a mile a minute, hoping that I got a clear picture. 

I watched it go from tree to tree for quite a bit. It is a very vocal bird and I loved hearing what it had to say.

On the way back, I saw a couple of hawks hunting. They were too high up to get a very good shot, but I was happy to see them.

I am grateful that the sunny day brought me outside to find these wonderful birds.

The heron was standing behind the palm tree that the kingfisher landed on. I did not have to go far! Of course best viewed large.