In order of Interestingness, Flickr

OK, I need to break myself into winter slowly here! One grey and white winter bird shot is all I can take without a splash of colour before I post the next grey and white shot, LOL. This is a shot in the Butterfly House at the Calgary Zoo. I noticed that a lot of the plants are beginning to die in there - this will be a sad season, but hopefully I'll be able to find some bright flowers in bloom in the Conservatory over the winter months. A very "cluttered" photo, but I like the detail on the butterfly. Next time ....

Ha, I just love the pose I happened to catch in one brief moment, when this little House Sparrow, along with a few others, flew into a bush near where I was standing at the Calgary Zoo. Some people dismiss these birds as being "just" House Sparrows, but I love trying to photograph them : ) I think she has such pretty feather details. Taken on 16 April 2013.

Lol, I got a surprise when I downloaded the few photos that I'd taken at Inglewood Bird Sanctuary on 4 March 2013! Bet there isn't another photo on Flickr quite like mine! Sure, she's "just" an everyday Mallard, but .....

Another photo from 3 February 2013, when I went with friends for a day of driving the backroads SE of Calgary, in the Blackie area. The road in the photo is, of course, not one of the gravel roads. The mountains appear closer than they really are, thanks to high zoom. It was such perfect weather and the shadows on the snow were a bright blue, just as you see in the photo. This was the day on which we saw 17 owls (12 Snowy Owls and 5 Great Horned Owls). What more could one wish for?

Can't remember if this was the first time this person had ever had a little Chickadee fly down to her hand - something every human being should be able to have happen at least once in their lifetime : ) Taken at Sikome, Fish Creek Park, on 17 February 2013. During the long, cold winter months, these tiny birds are just 24 hours away from death - they need to be able to get enough food to create a layer of fat on their body to keep warm enough to survive. In the winter, their brain expands in order to let them remember where they hide every single seed that they find. Wish this happened to humans, too - I could do with that all year round : ) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black-capped_Chickadee www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Black-capped_Chickadee/id&quot ;

A somewhat different kind of photo for my photostream, though I love photographing old barns when I'm lucky enough to see them. I thought this old window was interesting - though an owl (of any kind!) sitting in the open window would have been an added bonus : ) Seen SE of Calgary on 3 February 2013.

Our territory (section of the huge circle) for the Horseshoe Canyon/Drumheller Bird Count was on the north side of the Red Deer River, including the Tyrrell Museum and nearby farmland. We also stopped briefly at this overlook at Horsethief Canyon, which is 16 km from Drumheller, just past the Royal Tyrrell Museum on North Dinosaur Trail (Highway 838). About an inch and a half down from the top left corner, you can just make out a line of trees and the frozen river. Can you imagine how easy it would be to get lost down there? This is dinosaur country, the wonderful Badlands of Alberta! Earlier in the day, we drove some of the residential alleys looking for birds at feeders as well as in trees, and walked along the edge of the river at McMullen Island (it only becomes an island when the river level rises). The Red Deer River was completely frozen; 12 inches of snow cover. The day started off cloudy, clearing to beautiful sunshine, calm and a temperature of -14C soaring to 6C (yes, that's +6C!). Left my house at 5:40 a.m. and got home maybe 7:45 p.m. (?) Total kms-73; Total kms by car-68; Total kms on foot-5. Total hours-7; Total by car-4.5; Total on foot-2hrs; In cafe-0.5 hrs.. Just in case anyone is interested in what species the four of us found, this is the list for the day: Rock Pigeon-1 Eurasian Collared Dove-24 Great Horned Owl-1 Snowy Owl-1 Downy Woodpecker-5, Hairy Woodpecker-4 Northern Flicker-4 Pileated Woodpecker-1 Blue Jay-4 Black-billed Magpie-38 Black-capped Chickadee-17 White-breasted Nuthatch 3. Bohemian Waxwing-96 White-winged Crossbill-2 Common Redpoll-139 House Sparrow-42 We actually saw a total of six Snowy Owls, but only one actually in our Count area. As far as photos for the day are concerned, all I managed bird-wise was a Eurasian Collared Dove, a Red Crossbill and a couple of Snowy Owl photos. However, the scenery covered in snow was beautiful (and, as usual, my photos don't even begin to do it justice). It looks so different in the winter.

It's the "Famous Five" again : ) Took a drive SW of the city a couple of afternoons ago, 10 November 2012, expecting to see a lot more snow on the fields. Some roads were more snow-covered than others. Plenty of snow at the edges of the roads, though, so I had to be careful that I didn't pull off the road more than a few inches, as I really didn't want to find myself stuck. It felt so good to finally have a sunny day after two or three weeks of overcast, dreary weather!

Here in Calgary, we don't get those wonderful Maple trees that turn a glorious red in fall, that they get in Eastern Canada. Consequently, my eyes go straight to any kind of leaf that is remotely red. This one might be an Amur Maple? Seen by a pond at the Calgary Zoo on 6 October 2012. I always think of the very small, wild Gooseberry leaves (which turn a beautiful red) as my mini Maple leaves : ) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acer_ginnala