November 06th, 2023

Welcome to yet another Photo Safari Report!  I will call this one The Hike of Many Birds because we saw LOADS of them this time around.  We were surrounded!  And, unless you are in the Alfred Hitchcock movie, "The Birds", it's always a good thing.

I have to start this report with the little bit of time prior to the actual hike.  It was while I was waiting for Joy to arrive.  I generally wait outside, loaded up with camera, water bottle, phone and monopod. Anyone driving by knows what I'm about to do with one glance.  It is no secret.  Well except maybe to the kitty waiting inthe window, watching me.  Oh My Gosh.  It about broke my heart.

Before I walked out of the house that morning, I kissed Tim goodbye and petted both of the cats.  Wyatt just watched me walk away and jumped back up into the kitty tree for a snooze.  But Brysco walked me all the way to the door, right at my heels.  And then he got up into the kitchen window and meowed at me.  He meowed!!  So I stood on the outside of the window, one fingers pressed against  the screen as he purred on it explaining that I would be back in a little while.  And he meowed again.  And then gave me the sad kitty face.  OMG!    How am I supposed to ever leave the house again??

I steeled myself and with a final wave walked out of the courtyard and to the end of the driveway.  But as I waited, I couldn't help myself, occasionally I did look back at the window and his little kitty face was still right there pressed up against the screen.  My Heart!  Thank goodness Joy showed up right then.  I jumped in the car and we took off before I could change my mind.  It was sort of like leaving your child with a babysitter for the first time and they think you are never coming back!  

ANYWAY, to the hike.  We went to Oscar Scherer state park.  There are loads of trails so there are a lot of possibilities.  We like that.  We were greeted by a very cute little squirrel who was carrying around an acorn as if he had no idea where he was going to put it.
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You know it's going to be a good hike when it starts out that cute :)

​There were a few botanicals worthy of snapping:

But mostly it was about the birds. We saw all sorts of birds.  Birds in trees, birds in shrubs, birds in tall grasses.  Birds in the sky, birds on the trails, birds everywhere you can imagine.  Wow! Now, Joy is the Wildlife Photographer in this hiking/photo taking duo and her pictures are nothing short of gorgeous.  But here you are stuck looking at mine instead.  And I will be the first to admit that some of mine came out ok, but a lot of them are very meh.  So I'll give you the best of the "meh" photos first: (the only reason I'm posting them at all is because they are pictures of birds, that we saw and photographed.  You can skip this part if you want)

I think most of those shots were either taking directly facing the sun which is always a photo taking issue, or hiding out in shadowy bits,  but what you gonna do?  That's where they birds were!  (and come to think of it, they might have done it on purpose...the buggers)

​But a few other shots came out pretty well:

I have a few rando's for you too this time:

There you go, the Hike of Many Birds!  Considering how few bird photos I've posted in the past few Photo Safari Reports, I think I made up for it with this one ;)

By the way, Tim sent me a text with a photo of Brysco, still in the window waiting for me, about half way through the hike.  That's loyalty baby!

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