Sunny October Morning

These photographs were taken on a beautiful New England October morning. The sun was bright. The sky was a brilliant blue. And the wind was unusually calm despite the proximity to the ocean. The conditions turned the surface of the water in the pannes into a mirror.

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No. There isn’t a second flock of sandpipers flying upside down in this photo!

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The smaller birds fled the pannes when a Peregrine Falcon flew in to try to catch breakfast. I took this photo as it flew back over the water for a second try.

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Meanwhile, other birds were foraging around in the small trees and bushes across the road from the pannes. There was a pair of Golden-crowned Kinglets flitting around, making it hard for we photographers to get a clear shot. I managed to get these out of a lot of blurry and missed photos. The first is a female with a a solid yellow crest. There is a bit of orange in the crest of the second bird so it is a male. These small and very active little birds often appear to have no neck.

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Later in the morning we spotted a Ruby-crowned Kinglet. The red crest is hard to spot since they keep hidden unless they are excited.

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I like these pictures of a Greater Yellowlegs in flight and an Eastern Phoebe pausing in the hunt for insects.

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We scanned the ocean to see if there were any signs of ducks or loons moving in for the winter. These White-winged Scoters flying well offshore over the swells are a harbinger of what is to come along with the cold weather.

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