What caught my eye - August 2021

A somewhat relaxing month spent at cottages and local day trips.

Please note that some people might find the video at the bottom of this webpage disturbing.

A mid afternoon walk around Mud Lake early in the month was very quiet with most of the animals resting.

The mallards had settled down for the afternoon, I didn't even see the third one until I got home and started editing the pictures. Just the one cardinal was in evidence, and he was either a juvenile, or an adult coming out of moult.

There seemed to be an abundance of frogs:

leopard, bull and green frogs.

Green frogs look like bull frogs, but have ridges down their backs, while with the bull frogs, the ridges turn down and surround their ears.

leopard frog

bull frog

green frog

The neat looking orange coloured spotted jewelweed blossoms were everywhere. A few had gone to seed and ready to violently spring open at a slight touch (for which they are also called "touch me not" flowers).

The white arrowhead flowers were much in evidence and a few Queen Anne's Lace flowers were curling up to go into their seed stage. A few maple leaves were turning colour already.

Spotted jewelweed

Arrowhead flowers

Queen Anne's Lace blossom progressing to seed

maple leaves

And last but not least, two fungi caught my eye

Another Mud Lake visit towards the end of the month, but this time in the earl(ish) morning, was not quite so quiet.

The wood ducks were out and about, a few showing a little post-moult colour.

male wood duck

All females on the log

looking for cracked corn on the bridge railings

A few other birds showed up, including an Osprey, some hungry chickadees and nuthatches and a friendly female downy woodpecker.

Osprey overlooking the lake

chickadee

nuthatch

downy woodpecker

A few more that caught my eye.

jack-in-the-pulpit seeds

grey squirrel

bull frog

pickerel weed blossom and bees

thistle and bee

And another trip to Parc Omega, this time on a very hot day. The gate-keepers/toll collectors/moochers were still very much around with some of the young ones now comfortable approaching cars.

female elk

white fallow deer

female elk and calf

youmg bull elk

fallow deer fawn and female

fallow deer fawn

white tailed deer

Arctic and black wolves relaxed while the alpine ibex climbed to the top to have lunch.

Arctic wolf

black wolf

alpine ibex

With the heat several animals headed for the water to keep cool.

The bear was low enough in the water that he had scrunched up his nose to keep it above water.

The Parc obtained two orphan moose young last year. They have been quite shy and hard to find, but now fresh tree branches are put out for them each day in an open area, and the water attracted them on this hot day.