Thanksgiving Leftovers

I hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving and for those who don't celebrate the holiday, there's always something to be thankful for anyway. I just finished up a huge plate of Thanksgiving leftovers along with some cake and pie. Right now, I am about as lazy as could be. I decided this would be a good time to use up some of my leftover photos and video. They are in no particular order. I'll decided to add some brief comments using the bullet method. This turned out to be a mistake because I accidentally deleted photos from this post about 6 times by trying to shorten the space between the photos and paragraphs. Once I deleted them, they had to be uploaded all over again.

• The top photo is a view of the Connecticut River from the Gillette Castle observation area taken today at the end of a Hartford Audubon Field trip. This is a good area to see Bald Eagles from during the winter. We saw one adult and one immature Bald Eagle here today.

• Before stopping at Gillette Castle, we worked off a few calories with a walk through Machimoodus Park in East Haddam. The birds were kind of quiet today but we did manage to see a few interesting species including a Hermit Thrush, Bufflehead and a good-sized flock of Eastern Bluebirds. There were hunters trying to shoot ducks in the cove while we were trying to look at them. A few bird shot even made their way up the hill and into our area.
  


• Last weekend I took a ride to a private Simsbury home to see a Calliope Hummingbird. I couldn't resist taking a photo of this chickadee while I was there.

• I did see the Calliope Hummingbird which is very rare is Connecticut. I think only one other one was seen last year but it must have got the word out to his friends because another one showed up this year in Simsbury. It was really nice that the owner let people up on the deck to view the hummingbird. There was no morning light where the photo was taken and I didn't want to use the flash. The owner of the house is into sports and is betting his Calliope Hummingbird will stick around longer than last year's Calliope Hummingbird. He calls the bird Charlie and keeps it's feeder well stocked with nectar.

• This young deer was feeding on the grass about 10 feet away from road workers along Research Parkway in Meriden and didn't seem to have a worry in the world.

• I saw my first Hooded Mergansers of the Fall last weekend. I like them so I took a picture of them. That's all I have to say about that.
  


• I posted one photo of a Palm Warbler from my October camping trip already but I like the way the sunlight shows the yellow underneath the tail of this one.
  
  
  
• Here is a video of Theresa Kramer talking at the Northwest Park Nature Center during Hartford Audubon's Family Day which took place on October 5th. I hadn't posted this previously. I will post it now so I can delete it from my computer.
  


• Here is a video from last weekend of a Red-tailed Hawk getting mobbed by crows. Now I am going to relax and read a book but I'll be back out searching for birds tomorrow morning. Hope you enjoyed my Thanksgiving Leftovers!