July crept by. I’m glad August has arrived. The dog days are here to stay a few more months, but at least we’re closer to October.

I hope everyone is enjoying their summer. It’s been a busy one here. The grandkids were in a wedding on the beach earlier this month. They were so glad to be at the beach again. It was a cloudy day but still beautiful. Hopefully we’re going head back in a few weeks with our play clothes on. It’s hard to play hard when you’re all dressed up for a wedding, ya know?

It’s fun to think about playing hard when you’re all dressed up and being told not to play! Y’all better behave! Oh the joys of the young at heart.

Back to the swamp…. the wild hibiscus are in full bloom … everywhere up and down the creek in the low lands. They’re so pretty.

There’s hints all over the low grounds of a hot summer hard at work

I’ve spent a lot of early mornings and late afternoons on the creek bank

The Rain Crows have really been tuned up lately. I love hearing their song. They sure know how to keep a secret. I could look up there in the trees for hours trying to spot one and …. well, I kept the search for their secret to a minimum of 20 minutes.

The creek’s been way too low to put the boat in, but that’s OK. That’s when all the local landings are nice and vacant, and that’s when it’s the nicest to be with the quiet. A lot comes to you when you’re quiet.

Didn’t you see the sign back there? The No Wake Zone Sign? Oh, that’s right. I forgot. Someone took that entire tree down last year.

Some July mornings were very foggy

Spider web out in front….

Turkey vulture seemed to enjoy stretching those wings….

Core Creek was so low you could walk all the way to the river through the low lands, which isn’t unusual for this time of year even with the torrential rains we’ve had.

What was unusual was the urge to keep walking – as hot as it was. It was so damned hot not a creature was stirring anywhere. The only thing stirring was gar. The gar were everywhere. Good ole gar. That’s when you know the water’s about 85 degrees and that you were delirious when you decided to start walking the path you thought might not be that hot. I had the whole delirious path to the river all to myself.

I wonder where the operator of that rod and reel went. “HELLO?   Is anybody out there?  Would you like me to check your bait and throw it back?  You might catch a gar …… or a gator.”

I didn’t get an answer.

Well, I take that back…..   I just kept walking. And I walked a little faster all the way to the river. Seeing the White Egret on the other bank at the river somehow made the walk back feel a tad cooler. Hell no I didn’t take a dip. I didn’t care how much sweat was rolling off my brow.   I sure was glad to see the truck and the thermostat.

Some of July’s thunderstorms were absolutely awesome.

This July was a very personal month and personal time for our family. Matters of the heart, I guess you could say – our first July … nevermind

Though I’m glad it’s over, I saw some incredible sights, and the only reason is because I forced myself to get out there. I needed the time to myself and with nature.   And I’ve enjoyed putting together some blogs. This will probably be about my last WordPress post except to direct to my new blog when I finally get it going.

Cletus is doing great.  What a dog!   I went to the spot I found him and sat on the bumper of the truck and looked to the sky.  I knew I’d see some pretty things.     The Green Herons were so neat to watch coming from the northern sky headed to the woods closer to the creek.    The barn and tree swallows were everywhere, too.   And the clouds after the July storms were beautiful.   The month of July seemed unusually gorgeous.  It was also unusually void of the usual rock & roll.  It’s been  nice.

July Sky – photo blog

And the blog below….. ahh, seeing the juvenile Red-Tailed Hawk on that late afternoon was the very best birthday present I could have ever been given.   Dad and I celebrate the same birthday.   I was 50 years young.   He was 87 years young.

Juvenile Red-Tailed Hawk – photo blog

July is hop-way over?! I’ve missed everyone! And I want to thank you all for your kindness along the way. It’s more appreciated than you’ll ever know, and I will be so glad when I can catch up. I’m so … so…. so glad to be a part of July’s race, but I’m hopping July will hurry up and hop on out of here so I can stop all this racing around and just … just… just maybe sit!?

ON YOUR MARK

GET READY

GET SET

RUE —–>

RUE???!!! July is FULL of detours. The 4th of July in France – Tour de France!

Rue ——> Bourbon St

OK…. it wasn’t the detour I thought. It was only the 4th of July – Tour de Tobacco style.

“That’s some nice looking tobacco.” Absolutely it is. We rounded the first bend and looked towards the stretch of long-leaf pines.

There was a lot of activity……. a whole lot

I was adjusting the camera for another shot of the Phoebe …

Where did Phoebe go?

Gone With The Wind

Within the first few minutes of arriving we knew we were watching something like we had never seen before – not only as far as numbers of birds but the many kinds – all of them diving, swooping, lighting, diving again, darting, lighting…. ON YOUR MARK, GET READY, GET SET…… GO! Tanagers, grosbeaks, fly-catchers, Pheobes, Indigo Buntings, Kingbirds….

Smell that? It’s the unusually strong “fresh pine smell” in the air. It drew our attention to the debris scattered about the grassy fields – pine needles, small limbs, tattered and torn, some snapped off completely from the severe storm the night prior. Tall field grasses – once home and cover for so many bugs – flattened. What a disruption! Disruption from high winds uncovers many displaced and disabled insects. What a perfect greasy spoon – Grand Opening – All You Can Eat $5.99.

I should have never opened the car door. Most birds took flight to the stretch of pines we had just eased down from. Solution to that …. just ease on back …..

Not sure about this little fly-catcher ….. but oh how cute!

Casualties of Hurricane Floyd -1999, left standing thank goodness.

What a wonderful stretch of road to see beautiful migratory and year-round birds. Not a soul in sight. Well, almost… not a soul in sight….. a few weeks ago… yes Cletus knew exactly where to find the one soul who was in sight. OH, what a happy dog! He adores the cats, and they adore him. We’ve not laughed this much at dog/cat antics since …. I can’t remember since when. Cletus loves bath-time, too. He was so glad I finally got one.

Back home now, hurrying through the den. It’ kind of like a runway through the den – I can run through there blind-folded, turn the corner into the den from the hall, pass by the TV like a bullet, the bookshelf, go between the two recliners, hop over the short black blob on the floor (Lucky dog).

That’s what I was doing (hopping over Lucky) when I heard that voice…. though I’d not heard it in over two decades I knew it immediately, and it still had that same feeling to it. The recliner across from dad that had been empty for so long ……. it was still empty. I sat down. It was the first time I could remember – in years – feeling like stopping the rushing around I was doing at that time of night to get whatever I thought would need doing done. It could wait. It had been too long …. the recliner needed somebody.

Garrison Keillor, The Man On the Radio In Red Shoes.

One more spring in Minnesota,
To come upon Lake Wobegon.
Old town I smell your coffee.
If I could see you one more time –

I can’t stay, you know, I left so long ago,
I’m just a stranger with memories of people I knew here.
We stand around, looking at the ground.
You’re the stories I’ve told for years and years.

That yard, the tree — you climbed it once with me,
And we talked of cities that we’d live in someday.
I left, old friend, and now I’m back again,
Please say you missed me since I went away.

One more time that dance together,
Just you and I now,

don’t be shy.

This time I know I’d hear the music

If I could hold you one more time.

Sometimes things happen, I believe, for a reason. The voice that was never in a hurry……..

The weather has been beautiful lately. The high 90’s of a few weeks ago and high humidity were replaced with mid-80 temps last week making things so much more comfortable. The rains and the gardens – flowers and vegetables – have been kind and giving this season. The sights, the birds, the wildlife encounters, horizons, sunsets… all abundant.

I’m hoping to get another nature blog going at some point, maybe on Blogger. Transfer my sidebar links here to a sidebar there…. Something about WordPress is….. (hmm… maybe it’s not WordPress; maybe it’s me?)

I had the great pleasure of spending some MUCH needed time on the river last week. The Osprey family was most delightful to watch. The Great Ibis, Great Egrets, Great Blue Herons…. the skies, the flocks of birds, V-formations, such great numbers of beautiful flocks all going to their roost at the end of the day. It was beautiful.

See: Born on a river

(if you prefer no music, don’t click that little arrow!!!)

and there’s a big gap….. but the rest is down there….. and it’s here

It’s called July. July is here.

If the thing above doesn’t work, you can click here and listen to a July song, “I’ll Be There”

When things like … like July, or like … like July and frocked up 4-stroke Suzuki mothers… I mean motors that accelerate on their own like Christine, or like July and gasoline prices, or like whoever those jerks were who drove their pickup trucks to the edge of Joe’s cornfield and stole all his Silver Queen sweet corn we were going to pick yesterday on a July morning until we found out from Joe that some jerk or several stole every damn bit of it, uhh… (there’s bound to be something else in July) Oh yeah…. ticks, attached ticks, thermostat lies, frying chicken when thermostat arguments have not yet been resolved but have been if you know what I mean, cucumber vine rashes in July, picking cucumbers in July, smoke in the skies and my eyes from all the burning off of wheat fields going on around here in July, or…. or things like WordPress getting on my nerves because I can’t figure out why my songs from Groove shark won’t embed or play on this wordpress blog, or like when my Motown CD gets stuck in the CD player in the truck again because I thought it might not get stuck this time but it did anyhow, or like plugging a tire to that truck and feeling the handle to the reaming rod break from the force from trying to ream it, uhhhh….

here’s some of what I do…….

I try to figure out why the gray squirrels are turning red

or why the ones turning red aren’t completely red yet and only have red tails yet

or what all this Anole posturing is all about

when I know what it’s all about

and I can even see what it’s all about… it’s about that She Anole at the bottom right corner. And I wonder why she’s just watching the Anole battle that goes down all because of her … a battle that rarely results in death….

and when I’m tired of wondering about Anoles, I look at the truck and feel so glad the tire’s fixed

so I can go for a ride … somewhere…. anywhere. And wherever it might be I will be in control of the thermostat.

So I can get on another road where there’s no other traffic …. for possibly the next 100 miles. And that way I can stop right in the middle of the road and look out the window and see what might be down that canal …. look to the east

look out the other window and down the canal to the west ….

and then I can drive on….. and see how things like that smoke I can’t stand from the wheat fields burning can make the skies look so weird

and so pretty ….

or I can go out the next evening and see nothing but blue skies

or go out the next evening and see nothing but purple skies

or the next evening and see blue grosbeaks again and wonder again why we never see the Evening grosbeaks anymore…..

Just the Blue grosbeaks now… been that way for about 10 years. And I wonder why.

and I keep on driving and wondering why, and then I find something else to wonder about

like…. I wonder …… I wonder why I even opened the door

and I really REALLY wonder why I reached out to touch it when I’ve wondered the same thing so many times before and got the same old answer

Just look over your shoulders, Honey!

And I wonder…. is it because it’s July. Is that why? And there’s another gap….. but the rest is down there

If that thing above doesn’t work, you click here and listen to another July song: “I’ll Be There”

And you want, you can wonder if you like either of them, and if so which one you like better.

we’re going to go now and try to figure out where the mutant buck might be seen

and have July water fights instead ….. that fill in the gaps

and look at white spiders in the zinnias

and rescue pretty beetles

And it’s time for dinner! Soft shell crabs!!

This is the beginning of the dirt road that goes to the landing at the creek. I have thoroughly enjoyed this remote area for birding.

The dirt road is about a 1/2 mile long and travels to the creek.

I traveled about half way to the creek, stopped the truck, cut the engine off, and just listened. I could hear Summer Tanagers and was hoping one would emerge from the thick woods. This is wetlands area, and I heard Pronthonotary warblers as well.

This next picture….. I saw many white small birds flying towards the woods. They had passed right above the stopped truck. I lost sight of them quickly, which was disappointing because I knew that whatever I had just seen (white tail-ends) was something I’d never seen before. All the sudden I saw a small bird flying from the eastern sky towards the wire, where it lit and looked in the direction of the others. This one stayed on the wire for about 30 seconds and then flew to the edge of the woods where I then saw the white / cream colored birds take flight together along the edge of the woods that bordered an open field but not a farming field.

Cropped from image above for close-up view

Another picture – I was standing right outside the truck door

this is a cropped from image above for close-up view

one more shot…..

cropped from image above for close-up view

and then the bird flew to the woods where his friends had flown.

This is a picture of the wooded area they flew – I was standing on the dirt road.

This is a picture of the last wheat field and the woodlands just prior to entering the section of the dirt road below that quickly becomes surrounded by the woods and wetlands only – getting very close to the creek now

Dirt road headed towards the boat landing (a nice one.) This is one of the most beautiful areas – one full of opportunity to see wildlife and birds

Well…. me and my snakes….. I just couldn’t resist attempting to get a close-up picture of this yellow-bellied water snake who – as they always do – was too quick to flee the scene before I had even taken two steps in his direction

back to the cover he goes…. pausing only momentarily before disappearing into the grasses

I drove to the landing, turned around, and headed back out. Ivy-covered old barn…. holds many memories of the yesteryears of Core Creek

Looking out my window towards the eastern sky….the colors of the evening were coming together and to paint one of the most colorful skies in all directions I could remember seeing in a long long time. What a joy! I’d never seen a white bird, and the skies were going to cap it off with beautiful colors all the way home. There’s a slightly higher ridge more towards the left of this photo that turkeys always enjoy

Almost to HW 55 ……. one last look to the east above the woods that follow the Neuse River downstream

will be back soon

and ahhh….. the greatest dog on earth, Dear Raven, who was my dearly cherished companion. This was in 2004 coming out of the woods at Core Creek after a camping trip – just me and my buddy. Raven was always ready to go by land….. or

by sea. This was one of many boat rides he loved to take. This is in Village Creek

And in the middle we have “Lexus” AKA, The Great White Spirit of Core Creek, taking her nightly cruise to the river. I find the sighting of the white bird a special moment in and of itself, and I find it particularly special that I happened to see a beautiful white bird and – at about the same time – was thinking about the days Lexus was an icon at Core Creek. She lived a wonderful life and passed away a few years ago. Like Raven, she is sorely missed but will never be forgotten.

Mystery White Bird – if anyone has any ideas, or if you can help ID it or would like to offer suggestions, I welcome feedback and comments from all.