A little something for everyone, I hope.

Donna and Katie brought their Sunday morning birding group to Estabrook Park today, but I wanted to see what I could find before they arrived at 8 am, so I slipped into the park right around sunrise. I didn’t see the blackburnian warbler by the beer garden again, but I did see this crow who was very excited about something.

When the group arrived, we visited the pond first, and an olive-sided flycatcher (or two) put on a nice little show for us over the north end.

As we rounded the east side of the pond, we caught this white-tailed deer by surprise, and she quickly exited stage right into the woods. That’s her right, our left.

At the river, we saw a great blue heron or two, a couple of belted kingfishers, and a few eastern wood pewees, which kept together, so perhaps they were a parent with a fledgling or two.

Out on the water, as I counted the mallards and the Canada geese, look who I spotted sunning itself on the far riverbank. That is probably the big one of the three spiny softshell turtles I first spotted just one year and ten days ago. It may not have been what the birders were hoping for, but I was thrilled.

Fortunately, the air show began soon after that when the osprey, which I had already glimpsed three times this morning, decided that the crowd of people standing on the near riverbank with binoculars was no big deal and started hovering and circling over the river right in front of us.

That’s a five-and-a-half-foot wingspan.

We eventually wrapped up the visit, and most folks seemed happy with it as they went on their way. Phew. I headed to the pond to see if I could get any more pictures, and I almost startled this young great blue heron, but it must have been as intently focused on fishing as I was on finding dragonflies in the weeds at the edge of the water. Happily, I noticed it in time and backed away before anyone had to fly off.

In the northeast bay, a painted turtle was up for some sun, which we don’t get to see much of since I’m usually back home by this point in the day.

To round out our turtle trifecta, look who I spotted hiding in the algae right in front of me. You can just make out the little “saw-tooth ridged tail” of a small common snapping turtle.

At the other end, you can see its head and about a quarter of its four-inch-diameter shell.

AAt the south end of the pond, I found one of the several small orange dragonflies, which I had seen flitting incessantly over the water, finally taking a break. As good luck would have it, this appears to be our very first eastern amberwing (Perithemis tenera).

Finally, there was also a striking new butterfly on the burdock blossoms beside the soccer fields at the south end of the park, which appears to be a field skipper (Atalopedes campestris) huron sachem (Atalopedes huron), and that’s gonna be our butterfly of the day. I have since learned that field skippers, though similar in appearance, are limited to the west coast.