Tuesday, July 5, 2011

For the Birds

To tell you the truth, I've never really paid too much attention to the critters.  Living in the urban Northeast, birds were just part of the landscape: pigeons, doves, orioles, bluejays and the occasional cardinal.  But it's different in coastal Florida.  For one thing, birds are everywhere.  And they're big (relatively speaking).



We live on a lake so everyday I see ibis, egrets, ducks, geese and the homely turkey-duck (Yarn Widower calls them "turduckens").  They're noisy but pleasant neighbors.  A few days ago, we had a special visitor: a roseate spoonbill.

http://www.richard-seaman.com/Wallpaper/Nature/Birds/Waders/index.html

I'd never seen a pink bird before and I was enthralled.  In my own backyard no less!  Our showy guest flew away before I could get out the zoom lens for my camera - birds can be notoriously difficult photo models.  Plus given the choice of seeing with one's own eye versus through a camera lens, I'll take the former every time.

But I particularly like the eye of the late graphic artist Charley Harper:

http://www.circlecityframes.com/Description%20Pages/ft_roseate.html