Wet, but worth it!

The rain that was forecast last evening to commence at sunrise this morning was delayed, and it was coming from the west, so the skies to the east were clear, and it appeared that I would have a few minutes to see who I could see in Estabrook Park.

My first treat was finding this red-tailed hawk on the lawn across the parkway from the soccer fields. It was quite intent on catching whatever little critter it had seen, so it let me take as many pictures as I wanted, which is not the norm, and I especially enjoyed watching it stride across the lawn as it searched the underbrush. Too bad there wasn’t enough light for action shots.

It eventually gave up on that one and retired back to this perch atop a light pole to wait for another squirrel or chipmunk to venture out, so I let it be and continued north.

I stopped by the pond where there was a very agitated trio of kingfishers flitting about and shouting at each other, but nothing looked photogenic, so I pressed on.

At the north end, I couldn’t see anything more than a couple of herons, and dozens of mallards and geese out on the water. When I took a few steps inland, however, my second treat of the morning was this amazing sight in the few flowers that haven’t been mowed yet.

It’s a northern crescent, which we’ve seen before, but not in a couple of years, and it even showed off the gorgeous top sides of its wings.

Then the rain started, but it looked like the leading band would blow by pretty quickly, and then I’d have another gap, so I hustled up to the bridge at the far north end to wait it out. There, I was happy to see the pigeon chicks off their “nest” for the first time. Good for them.

On my way back south, I didn’t see anybody new, so I kept going. When I paused beside the southern island to see if the waterthrush we saw yesterday was still there, and it was, I heard a call from back upstream that sounded to me like that of a Cooper’s hawk. Thus, I hustled back north, and this is the first bird I found in the canopy above: one of our great horned owls.

They don’t sound like that, however, so I kept searching, and found a second owl. Awesome!

A few more steps, and I could finally see who was making all that noise, and it was indeed this Cooper’s hawk.

Before I could get a picture of the hawk and owl together, which would have been pretty cool, the hawk repositioned itself, but it didn’t go far from the owls, …

and the the second owl followed it very closely. But the rain was returning by then, so I wouldn’t be taking any more pictures skyward, and I left them to sort it out amongst themselves.

Back at the pond, these wood ducks had arranged themselves so nicely, and I could shoot downhill to keep my lens dry, so I figured it was worth taking the rain cover off my camera for a few seconds.

Finally, the kingfishers were still at it, and these two posed together for just a moment, so here they are. The one in the lower left, with a full, rusty, belly-band, appears to be a mature female, and the one in the upper right, with only a patch of rust, appears to be a juvenile, perhaps a recent fledgling hanging out with mom.

Lastly, the only butterfly I saw today was that tiny northern crescent, so here’s one last, low-light look at the butterfly of the day.