San Diego Zoo

Famosa Slough Bird and Nature Walk

 On the third Saturday of the month there's a bird and nature walk at the Famosa Slough near where I live. This afternoon I went over for the second time.

Most of the birds are actually gone this time of year except for the year around residents like this black crown night heron shown to the left.

This immature black crown was also hanging out.

There were some great egrets to be found too.




 

Along the San Diego River Bike Path

TernWatch - Part 4

 I got these three pics of the California Least Tern chicks when I was on predator watch this morning.

 I'm going to work on trying to get the focus better. This is the best I know how to do for now... new camera.

Cute little buggers eh?

Tuesday at Balboa Park...

Our President...

Ternwatch - Part 3

Today a lot of the nests seemed abandoned like these two.

... and then a lot of them weren't.

Mom bringing a nice fish for her chick to have for lunch.

A picture borrowed from Wikipedia of a California Least Tern chick. 

Balboa Park Model Railroad Museum

Today was a resident free Tuesday at the model railroad museum at Balboa Park. So after arriving sort of late and having a late lunch I headed for the railroad museum.

It must be quite some time since I've been there since the Tehachapi Loop seemed to be a lot more developed from the last time I saw it.

I spent most of my time today looking at the Southern Pacific-Santa Fe Tehachapi, described above. [click the pic for a bigger view]

As the picture above shows sometimes it's hard to tell where the model stops and the backdrop starts.

It's kind of amazing to see what two or three decades and a few dozen people can accomplish in their spare time.

DSL Internet Connection...

My "regular" DSL AT&T internet access ENDS on June 24th. I've had it with those lying, cheating bastards. I'll have irregular access via my apartment complex clubhouse WiFi and cell phone. But my AT&T DSL access is kaput on 6/24. Probably I'll weaken at some point and sign up with a different DSL provider but at this point I'm willing to endure a lot of inconvenience in order to be beholden to NOBODY... especially AT&T... F_CK'EM. I'll accept the Pyrrhic victory at this point.  

Agua Dulce Creek Birding With San Diego Audubon

I drove up to Mt Laguna an hour east of San Diego, on the far right side of the map above on Friday morning. [click on the map for a larger view]

In the late morning and afternoon I hiked to Water of the Woods and Big Laguna Lake. I've lived here for nearly four years now as this is the fullest, nearly to the outlets, I've seen these lakes.

I always expect to see Hoss, Little Joe, and Pa Cartwright come riding through the meadow... but had to settle for these two women on horseback today.

I stayed over Friday night near Mt Laguna at the Burnt Rancheria Campground to go on a San Diego Audubon bird walk at nearby Agua Dulce Creek. There were LOTS of woodpeckers, flycatchers, wood pewees, swallows, nuthatches, and juncos. An acorn woodpecker is pictured above... we also saw Nuttles, ladder-back, and hairy woodpeckers.

The forest floor next to the trail was covered with wildflowers in bloom too...

Ternwatch - Part 2

The picture below shows one of many chicks that can now be seen at the Mariners Point tern nesting area in Mission Bay where I spent two hours this morning looking for tern predators. Pretty cute eh? The Dept of Fish & Wildlife guy dropped off a dead western gull to scare away others who might be thinking about eating a baby tern.