IN A CAR DOWN BY THE RIVER

The weather has finally warmed up to no-jacket spring temperatures.  So I took my painting gear and my camera to a picnic area down by the river.

 The trees are just starting to leaf out and there isn’t a lot of color except scruffy browns and tans.  I decided to just sit in my car to do some sketching.

 While I was setting up I saw a young moose across the river munching on some young willow branches.

 It hung around for a while and then wandered off.

 A muskrat went by with a mouth full of sticks to spruce up her den.

 A pond turtle came out on the bank to catch a few rays of sun.

 Then a boat slowly drifted by with a guy, who looked a lot like Donald Sutherland, and his friend doing a little fishing.

 They probably saw me in the car and wondered why I was staring at them so much.

 They weren’t the only ones after fish.  This seagull had some sort of bullhead or carp and he wasn’t sharing.

 This gull looks like he scored with a small trout.

 Here’s a hawk cruising for mice.

 Way across the river and through my dirty windshield I snapped this shot of a wild turkey.

 Two avocets were doing a little yoga.  Nice tree pose.

 Here’s one that doesn’t have his head tucked in so you can see the curved beak they use to sweep through the shallow water for little bugs and stuff.

 Have you ever seen a two-headed coot? Okay, just kidding.  The brown duck with the red eyes is a cinnamon teal.

 In the end I only managed to finish two sketches but I got a whole lot of photos.

"The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time."  Bertrand Russell