truly wild pictures!!

[QuackerJackFarms]

Quote:
I haven't heard one in years. I know the Missouri Conservation is trying to get people to not mow their fields so the natural grasses can grow. The highways and parks have stopped mowing certain areas. I hope that's helping. It's sad.

Quakerjack come for a cold beverage some evening. I have one in my neighborhood I hear all the time. On a few occasions he has spent the day roosting in one of my oaks. One time I was out around the chicken pen and the chickens started acting spooky, that tail up, wings downs, neck feathers on end look. They all started looking upward. Of course I looked too. It took me several minutes to spot the owl. He had probably been the all morning and it took the hens several hours to spot him. He was very difficult to pick out against the trunk of the tree.

Awesome! St Louis County right? I've got a brother in St Charles. Surely that's close to you since it has a "St." in front of it. LOL!

 

[scooter147]

Quote:
Quakerjack come for a cold beverage some evening. I have one in my neighborhood I hear all the time. On a few occasions he has spent the day roosting in one of my oaks. One time I was out around the chicken pen and the chickens started acting spooky, that tail up, wings downs, neck feathers on end look. They all started looking upward. Of course I looked too. It took me several minutes to spot the owl. He had probably been the all morning and it took the hens several hours to spot him. He was very difficult to pick out against the trunk of the tree.

Awesome! St Louis County right? I've got a brother in St Charles. Surely that's close to you since it has a "St." in front of it. LOL!

Yes, next county to the west.

 

[Kassaundra]

Quote:
Is the GHO endangered at all? I just remember as a kid hearing them all the time at night. Now... nothing.

And now that I think about it... same with the bobwhite quail.

Anyway, just curious.

I used to go to sleep listening to whipporwills.

 

[spectrumranch]

 

[kari_dawn]

spectrumranch, those are beautiful pictures! Thank you for sharing them with us!

 

[spectrumranch]

Bahama Bug control:

Baracuda- while snorkling:

Ray:

Wild Dolphins checking out the boat while fishing:

 

[trailchick]

I think the loss of habitat for owls-quail, and other wildlife is a big reason we don't see as many.
People burn their brush piles, and cut down large habitat trees.
Owls will nest in old barns too, & alot of those are being torn down.
Suburbia encroaching on areas with wildlife also a factor.

We have a covey of blue scale quail that come by our place and a couple of neighbors.
A big snow has been on the ground for a couple of weeks so I havent seen them - they usually
come by the wild bird feeding stations and the chicken area. I have been trying to keep some
brush piles for areas for them. They are always very nervous, wary, and alert to their environment.....

I would love to set up some nest boxes in a few of our big cottonwood trees to see what i could attract next spring.

Nice bird pics Spectrum.

I hear the wipporwill & bobwhite in when we go to Arkansas, also the screech owl, piliated woodpecker, I love it down there, in the woods !!!!

 

[galanie]

I agree, habitat loss is devastating. I didn't realize how much it's happening here close to me until recently. There is an old "sand pit" that hit a spring eventually and so has been a smallish, maybe 4 acre lake for the last 40+ years a few blocks from me. It's been left alone all this time except for one side where some townhomes were built about 10 years ago. Recently, someone decided to surround the whole thing with townhomes or apartments or whatever they're called this year. Suddenly, I'm seeing Louisiana Herons in my water lily pond every evening looking for frogs this fall after construction started. Now I hear a screech owl in the evenings that I never heard before. Migrating geese are heading that way, seem confused for a moment then keep flying west to east instead of the northwest to roughly south that I remember in past years. Who knows what else has been displaced by having this habitat (that never was recognized as such) be destroyed. Sad.

 

[debs_flock]

Photography, yet another one of my hobbies!

Here's a couple I have uploaded.

I was taking pictures of seagulls playing off the end of the ship I was on and this pelican shot past me.

This was a HUGE moth that was on the wall in Mexico.

This is one of my glass frogs.

And I had to throw in a picture of a bracket fungus.

Deb

 

[Melissa Rose]

Quote:
Is the GHO endangered at all? I just remember as a kid hearing them all the time at night. Now... nothing.

And now that I think about it... same with the bobwhite quail.

Anyway, just curious.

I used to go to sleep listening to whipporwills.

We still have whipporwills here

When they are in the distance it is delightful

When they are sitting right outside our bedroom window it's kind of

Merrrry Christmas Everyone