What caught my eye

May is always a busy month what with spring wildflowers, returning birds, and so on.

COVID was still interfering but there was lots of things to catch my eye including flowers, birds, snakes, turtles, frogs, rusted cars, murals etc

I came across more garter snakes than usual this year, maybe because I was out more?

Outside Almonte I had a face to face discussion with one and was fascinated with the tongue sensing the air.

Then another garter snake, this one in town, led me to a “nest” of 4-5. I managed to get a shot with 3 still in the “nest”.

The annual tulip festival provided many missed opportunities, but I was happy with a few.

I was quite pleased with the serendipitous abstract "tulip bubbles".

The early spring produced three types of trilliums, jack-in-the-pulpits, trout lilies, squirrel corn, columbine and on and on..

Painted trillium

white trillium

red trillium

spring beauty

trout lily

two-leafed toothwort

squirrel corn

jack-in-the-pulpit

blue violet

yellow violet

bugleherb

apple blossoms

apple blossom

grass in bloom

columbine

star flower

clintonia

lily-of-the-valley

honeysuckle

phlox

foam flower

dogwood/bunchberry

wood sorrel

daffodil

My "can’t pass a wood duck without taking a picture" syndrome added to the wood duck collection, along with pictures of Canada geese (ugh), American restart, phoebe. A mourning dove who was reluctantly accustomed to people entering the door beneath her nest caught my eye. The ravens were nesting at Mud Lake again this year, the nest was difficult to see, but not hard to hear. As were the fledglings after leaving the nest. Ravens also operated a wake-up service at home one morning.