There is a lot going on this fall in our garden and on the marsh.  We have seen flocks of White Ibis grazing the marsh for fiddlers crabs. Below is a juvenile hanging out on our dock showing off its beak and wing feathers.

 

Another frequent guest is this Great Egret.

Several pairs of Wood Ducks have been vacationing in our neighbor’s pond. They are very skittish if I venture too close and immediately fly off returning only after I have left the scene. Therefore the photo is not great. I have to keep practicing to get the right settings on my camera to catch the fast shots.

And it is not all about birds. We have hundreds (literally!) of these wonderful, insect eating Carolina anole lizards. They are great posers!

 

Oh yeah, what about the owls?

Well – we hear them. Almost every night. There is a lot of hooting going on and it is decidedly different from when they are on the hunt (wink, wink). We very rarely see them. We often hear them in the trees in the back garden and they are close together. Once in a while I catch site of one on the roof of our dock in the early dawn. And we continue to find dinner remains on our t-top.

We are fully expecting them to nest near us again this year. We have been scouting out all the abandoned squirrels nest and tree hollows so we will know where to look when they nest. We are brushing up on our knowledge of Great Horned Owl mating rituals. And we volunteered with the Center for Birds of Prey as re-nesters.  More about that in another post.

Just in case…

OK. I know it is near impossible and highly (extremely) improbable that the owls will use the nook of the Live Oak Tree where we relocated the Owlets last winter after they continually fell out of their original nest…

But I couldn’t help myself.

Yes, I collected buckets of Spanish Moss and small twigs to fortify the Nook. I even decorated with fall leaves, feathers and dried grasses! I think mine looks much sturdier than that old rickety squirrels’ nest. Seriously.

I took this shot of sunrise on the marsh a few days ago.