Birds. Yep.

[julian]

A couple days ago, I went to hang out on a rock down near my local pond, and this mute swan family (two adults, two juveniles) turned right around and came swanning toward me expectantly.



Someone feeds them, clearly, and possibly *from that spot*, even. I felt bad, because I had nothin' to give them, but I took advantage of the opportunity to take some ridiculous close-ups. (I mostly don't take pictures of swans lately, because they're elegant, they're white, and they're going to keep being elegant and white, but these guys were *right there*.)



Mom (or dad) had been eating underwater.



Nice light on the side of one of the juveniles.



A juvenile rear end.



Blindingly white adult side.





Also, I have met a yellow-shafted flicker, common mergansers, hooded mergansers, and what I think are ring necked ducks, in addition to mallards, down there. This one, however, has me stumped. Is it a grebe? The beak seems too long. (Found him after the swans.)

ETA: Probably either a female or non-breeding male ruddy duck.



As for another batch of birds, today, I was out admiring the foot or so of snow we got this morning, and there were *starlings* on our *vines*. (We're on a corner; we have the house, the the driveway/parking lot, then there's the vines down by the side road.) That's usually the sparrow territory, and I'm biased against starlings. Hmph. But given how snowy it was, I guess I can't really blame 'em. (And it may be their turf in the morning, for all I know, I tend to take my walks later.)





They were also hanging at my neighbors' feeder. (I would have thought the younglings would have stopped begging by now, but I guess not.)



By this afternoon, the sparrows were back in their proper place, being perched blorps, though not, today, making a racket. I would assume the snow has them a bit down.



These two are distracted by something not me, for once.

Comments

[rose_griffes]

Very soothing.

[julian]

It made me happy.

[leecetheartist]

Where I am, swans are black. White ones always look very odd to me.

[julian]

*looks them up on wiki* Ooo, pretty. The red beak is somethin'.

[yourlibrarian]

Love seeing the birds, and one can see the water beads on that first swan photo! No idea on the mystery bird but I'm intrigued as I don't think I've seen one before.

[julian]

Yah! That was why I posted any of the swan pictures, because of that one. Fortuitous accident leads to Good Stuff.

[steorra]

The beak on your mystery bird looks very duck-like to me. I'm wondering if it could be a nonbreeding male Ruddy Duck. If you look the species up, the most prominent photos are of the flashier breeding males (bright blue bill, very reddish brown back), but the more subdued nonbreeding males look similar to your bird - similar kind of large pale patch starting at the bottom of the eye that doesn't go all the way to the back of the neck, dark brown crown, medium brown body, dull dark bill.

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Ruddy_Duck/overview

[julian]

Oh! Yeah. That would make total sense. Or a female, either way. The brown 'cap' and the brown back reinforce the idea. I think the beak's just odd, or possibly he/she was eating something and I just didn't know.

Thank you, that was bugging me.

[steorra]

I think it's less likely to be a female because they don't seem to have that same shape of pale patch on their face.

[julian]

Check. Thank you!

[sylvaine]

Eeeeeeee, birds! ♥♥♥

[shirebound]

Those are incredible swan shots! Next time you'll have your pockets filled with goodies for them. :)

[cmcmck]

I love the detail shots of plumage!

Just wonderful.