(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Daily Bucket Friday Sequence: Appy Trails Variety Pack [1] ['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.'] Date: 2023-07-28 The variety of bird species who visit my feeders is about the most variety that happens in my life. I mostly stay home here at Appy Trails Ranch, other than the short trips that make up my birding patch no more than 15 miles away in every direction. My priority is to know the birds and animals that I deal with on a daily basis as well as I possibly can. I post pics of my feeder birds on a regular basis so let’s look around at what else is around on a regular basis. Flint Hills of Kansas on 7/28/23 and over 100 degrees again today! “Phenology is a science that anyone can practice without a lab coat, microscope, or PhD. It's the study of seasonal events such as first flowers, appearance of certain butterflies, etc. People have tracked these dates for decades -- even centuries -- and now there's a place on DK to record your own observations. A casual spot to tell what you're seeing in the park down the road or in your own back yard.” (Created Feb 14, 2011) RISE AND SHINE! You might want to rock ‘n roll a little bit first. Every day begins and ends with horses for me so it seems only fitting this diary follows suit. Sweet Spot rolling in the hay. She rolls this way... and she rolls that way. She rolls every which way she can and it feels SOOO good! Waka patiently waits his turn. Waka gets his turn and tries to out roll what Sweet Spot did. Believe it or not he thinks this is how you get clean! Is he making a point, or does it really feel this good? One thing for sure it sure does get the flies off. This is how you Rise and Shine in STYLE! I remember when I was a kid hearing an old wives tale saying if you count how many times a horse rolls over it will tell you how much the horse is worth. If there is anything to that I have some extremely valuable horses! LOL During the summer my horses choose to spend most of their days in the barn, going out to pasture at night. But in the barn, or out, they keep a sharp lookout. This is what you call undivided attention. Waka has his eye on what I am looking at… This Blacksnake is about 4’ long and is heading straight for the corral fence. That could be a huge mistake. As in Waka huge! Waka herded the snake all the way down the length of the corral until it exited at the far end. That is more than fifty yards. When I enter the barn to feed the horses I am greeted by Swallows flying around to make sure everything is as it should be. As I go about my business they perch on nests, walls, and electrical conduit hanging from the ceiling rafters to watch. They don’t just watch. Main Papa on an overhead conduit talking to me while I do my chores. After the horses are taken care of I go back toward the house to fill the bird feeders and get BJ fed. Sometimes BJ would rather chase his ball than eat. I am the one and only person BJ willingly gives his ball to. But if I am not going to play ball with him he will drop his ball somewhere he thinks someone will find it and give it a toss for him. If that should happen to be you DO NOT TEASE and fake a throw. Think about it. That ball is attached to your arm until you have thrown it. A few Cottontail Rabbits established residence here after Happen died and so far have managed to avoid BJ’s pursuit. But just by a hare! This handsome Red Bellied Woodpecker is kind of the bully in chief at our feeder area. He settles all feeder disputes. Not even Blue Jays will stand up to him. There are two pair of Red Bellied that call this place home. There are also two pair of Downy who visit all times during the day, but recently a fifth has come and it is significantly larger than the others. So far though it has been too shy for me to get a good photo. Here is Bully leaving the feeder area to deliver a load of suet, presumably to a nest full of babies. A young mother raccoon discovered our feeder area and set up shop here as a daily, and nightly, stop. I have to bring any remaining suet cake inside every night or it is gone by morning with the feeder laying on the ground. Then she began bringing her three babies. So now there are four… No feeder is safe from their prying paws. I IDed this as a Carolina Wren. It’s the first time I’ve seen one here. It was in the woods that come right up to the back of our cabin. We were blessed by the visit of a Painted Bunting again this year. It was the longest such visit ever, extending to about 17 days in a row before it disappeared. Much to my surprise I saw it again while sitting on my bucket at the pond on an exceedingly hot day in JULY. He is a VERY shy bird, but I guess on this particular day he was VERY thirsty. We have had fewer casual visitors to our pond this year, but there have been some. I enjoyed the chance to see a Great White Egret make four successful hunts while stalking the perimeter of our pond. It was the first such bird that ignored my presence and just went about its business. Four out of five stabs produced a fish from the salad bar. The GWE turned down the nutritional value offered by a water snake that lives here. Water Snake GBH heading out for the larger watershed across the road and on the other side of the hill. He didn’t really want to leave but was just too leery of me being so close. He ran a ways up into the pasture but came back three times before he finally decided to take off. I wonder if that GBH even noticed this turtle lounging on an algae pad out in the middle of the pond. It is one of many. As near as I can tell Main Papa counted at least nine on this pass, but I think he missed some over by the black water under the overhanging Willows to the left of this image. Doves drink too! You can bet the Crow sitting atop the old snag over at the edge of the corral didn’t miss a thing! The top pf his snag perch isn’t going to last a lot longer. It seems strange that it survived the big blast of the recent storm while so many large healthy tree didn’t. For me summertime is Swallow time. Jeff asked me to show some pics that show more context with the birds at the pond. I have recently taken up the challenge of trying to get more than one bird in focus at a time. More than one bird AND background is a tall task for me if you want birds you can see. Swallows are about double the size of a Hummingbird, so at 40 yards are not easy to spot at high speed. Swallows flying alongside the dam at our pond. I’m sitting on my bucket about 30 yards away and looking through a lens at 200-300mm magnification. Anything higher and I have a lot of trouble getting them in the viewfinder. Pair of Swallows flying over the pond. This view is from south to north. I usually sit in the southeast corner in the shade of some nice aromatic cedars and a few Willows. This is one of my faves. I added serious crop to this one as the birds are good enough no one would have cared about all the dam weeds. Crop and zoom eliminates image background detail with my outfit. I said this diary would start and end with horses so I’ll end with more of mine out in their pasture. Which is where they’ll be putting me pretty soon! LOL. Sleek Hawk and ScatNMagic. There are deer, turkeys, and coyotes who visit our pastures regularly, along with the myriad of birds that visit our feeders. Every day is a new day. There are rumors of elk and cougars less than a mile away but so far I have not been able to photographically confirm those rumors. So I will keep my eyes open and hope for the best. I’m about as busy as a person can be these days but it’s a highlight of my day to see what you saw on yours. [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/7/28/2181762/-Daily-Bucket-Friday-Sequence-Appy-Trails-Variety-Pack Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/