A few birds for a nice January morning

The lesser scaup are hanging around near the shore of Lake Murray, waiting for handouts.  This is the time of year they try to fatten up for migration.

I first saw Pepper with Fish Food mama and her mate, but he was so bothered by me that he swam away and is hanging out by himself.  His brother is off chasing girls:

There is one little green-winged teal girl there, today.  I took this photo a few days ago:

This is all that is left of the resident geese.  The three other Canada geese aren't getting along with the white goose in the background, so they were off in the water on their own.

I took a photo of this blue-gray gnatcatcher the other day when I was counting the birds.  Today, I heard several California gnatcatchers:

Mama raven was being harassed by a crow (on the right) who wanted to steal a piece of trash that Mama raven was checking out.

I think this might be a young, sick, California gull.  A lot of young gulls get sick their first and second winter and don't make it.  Most gulls don't make it to full maturity:

I accidentally disturbed this black-crowned night heron.  Sorry heron!

Cold morning

This morning was cold and there was frost everywhere.  It's actually been cold with frost for several days now, but it might be warming up starting tomorrow.  The photo above is, I think, one of the two babies the "Snowies" had.  The "Snowies" are either a snowy mallard pair or a Welsh harlequin pair with at least half mallard.  You can see a little frost color on these two boys, the only survivors out of six ducklings.

 Below is a photo of Pepper, the duck with the broken wing on the other side.  I don't like his shape, it looks similar to Scoop in regards tot he belly area.  Pepper has a Cayuga shape, but the puffyness around the legs bothers me.  I'm hoping it's just fat and not water on his belly.  He's behaving normally.

"Baby" goose is being a jerk and chasing all the ducks around.  I think this confirms he's a gander afterall.  He no longer hangs out with the rest of the flock, but off to the side and on his own.

Something's wrong with Big Mama Cooper; she's acting weird.  She flew up right in front of me and landed on a tree trunk and didn't move even though she was looking right at me.  I started to take my camera out and she flew up in this other tree and didn't move.  I noticed in the photo that one of her eyes seems swollen and possibly draining. But, I think she might have been bathing a few minutes earlier.  Either that or she was sleepy.  She hardly ever lets me look at her for too long.  She seemed very tired and stayed in this tree for a half an hour.

Smudge was about twenty feet away from Big Mama, being quiet and blending into the ground.  But, she seemed unconcerned about the hawk.  I know she knows what a Cooper's hawk is as she lived where one regularly hunted.  She seemed fairly unconcerned about her.  She was pretty much the only bird in that area at that moment that a Cooper's hawk would traditionally hunt, so I was worried.  But, after I left I came back to check later and both of them were gone.

RIP "Scoop"

Scoop died last Saturday.  That day, he was caught and put in a crate in order to get him some help from a rescue center, but he died soon after being caught.  It was only a matter of time before he died from this problem as it didn't get better.   The Wednesday before,  I checked on him and he was barely functioning, but still alive enough to run away from me.  I almost grabbed him then, but I think it was already too late for him.

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George and Martha are back?

I thought I saw George around a few times, but wasn't very sure.  I think this next picture might be him:

And, I think this might be Martha. I thought it might be Dee, at first, but Dee doesn't have two very distinct marks on her face that this killdeer has.  Both George and Martha were spotted very early in the morning.

Later, I think I saw George with a different killdeer.  It looked similar to Martha, but its breast bands were thinner.  Perhaps one of their offspring?

I think this might be George, again.

I thought I would take a photo of Pepper with his good side.