Thursday, August 5, 2010
After a day spent trying to convince myself to get out for a run (I absolutely loathe the heat and humidity we've had much of this week...) and then briefly considering a ride at the Corning Preserve (until I verified that Thursdays are when the summer outdoor concerts happen there) I declared today a rest day and went for a short evening walk at Five Rivers, where the bugs really appreciated the fact that I didn't want to stink of bug spray for the rest of the evening... I won't miss the biting insects once cooler weather returns...
The highlights of my walk were
- watching the cedar waxwings zoom around over several of the ponds... there must have been a couple dozen of them darting all over the place, presumably eating insects (go, cedar waxwings, go!) and their aerial acrobatics were incredible.
- spotting a buck deer on the edge of the Birdwatchers Path... he moved to the opposite side of the path when I tried to get closer to get a better photo, and then a doe popped out of the bushes and joined him, before they both decided to head for cover.
- watching the beavers cruise around the far end of the Beaver Pond... there were three there briefly, including one that submerged for a while then came up pushing a big clump of roots and mud and proceeded to pack it against the dam they've built on top of the dam/spillway at the pond's outlet... so now I can say I've seen a wild beaver actually working on a dam, how cool is that?
- watching three bats flit around above the parking lot when I got back to the car, presumably eating insects (go, bats, go!) I even managed to catch a couple of vaguely bat-shaped blurs in the photos I took...
Next week I'll try to get over there for a run and cover a bit more distance than I did tonight.
JMH
