Sun behind clouds and the snow a shade of blue.
When winter is winter there is nothing you can do…
…but go outside and enjoy the day.
Author: Mike and Christy
Say’s Phoebe
The Say’s Phoebe is a quiet, slightly understated and delightful flycatcher found in dry habitats of the Western United States. This day we found a Phoebe perched upon a shrub hunting for insects on the ground below. It would sally out in typical flycatcher fashion and return to a similar location in this shrub sometimes with meal in beak.
Into the morning sun
A morning ski on the Blacktail Plateau in Yellowstone National Park. Tracked by nature yet not trampled.
One
A place where all is one. Where the river meets the sea. I love that this whole landscape is temporal even the sand that forms the bank of the river melts into the sea and then reforms with each ripple of water, each wave and each tidal cycle.
Black-billed Magpies
A Black-billed Magpie rests on a fencepost while over a dozen and perhaps more other Magpies feast on a Mule Deer Carcass nearby. In our neck of the woods Magpies are shy and typically fly off well before we can get a camera pointed on them. This day their attraction to the nearby feast overshadowed thier reluctance of humans and we got to observe them close-up for a significant amount of time.
We seldom see the blue in the eyes of magpies but this day was an excepting.
Seven Black-billed Magpies keep an eye out on a Corvid relative the Common Raven who also had an interest in the nearby Mule Deer carcass. Needless to say, a seven to one advantage kept the meal out of reach for the Raven.
Hot and Cold
Or perhaps warm and cool depending on your perspective.
A rising sun gives warmth to the day even when it cold outside.
A winters morning
The late rising winters sun mustered just enough power to cut through the morning clouds to give color to an American Bison on this somewhat overcast day. Roaming the sagebrush covered plateau was the order of the day for both man and Bison on a day that felt timeless in may ways.
Finally
Each fall we leave the coneflowers alone in the garden hoping that finches will come by and get a nice meal. Until last week we had not had a finch visit. Well that all changed as a lone American Goldfinch wandered by and quickly took a liking to dried, but full of seeds, Coneflowers.
Through it all
A little tribute to a good friend that we often hear singing from the junipers and shrubs which line the fields close by. Dark-eyed Juncos keep us company rain or shine and through wind and snow.
