Saturday, May 30, 2009

Last day of GSL Bird Festival

Bummer the picture is blurry, I've got a problem taking pictures while on a horse. Still you can see the coyote looking at us on the far edge of the shadow of the tree.

Last but certainly not least fun was our "Birds & Spurs" bird tour. Sunday morning 8:00 a.m. at the ranch on Antelope Island. Good thing we always try to be early for things. We made it just on time because of our, okay my desire to look at birds. We saw more birds going in to the ranch than we saw on the tour. That just doesn't matter though. We got to spend two hours riding around the environs on horses.

I signed up for this even back at the beginning of April. I hadn't been on a horse in ages. So for the subsequent 6 weeks I did strength training 4 days a week and rode horses a couple of times with the outdoors program. It worked! I was able to 1: Get on the horse. 2: Ride the horse without pain for 2 hours. 3: Dismount the horse with a modicum of grace. 4: Walk away from the horse without acting like a cripple. 5: Be able to walk the next day. I was very happy to have achieved all of those goals.

Our bird list included:
Ring-necked pheasant, California quail, Chuckar
Red-winged, Yellow-headed, and Brewers blackbirds
Magpies, Robins, Ravens
Horned larks, various unidentifiable warblers and flycatchers
Grasshopper sparrows, White-crowned sparrows, House sparrows, House finches
Cliff and Barn swallows
Wilson's snipe, Willets
Burrowing owl!!!

And then we also saw Mega-fauna
Pronghorn
Bison
Mule deer
Coyotes
and the skeleton of a bighorn sheep

Twas very, very cool and I hope to go again next year!

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