Normally I post "this morning's bird" on Mastodon, as I used to do on Twitter. I get some likes and comments, but they're about the same as I get on Flickr, which is to say, not a lot. Which is fine.

Since it's so easy to do it here now, and since micro.blog mirrors the marmot and posts it to Mastodon anyway, I might as well just do everything here.

Some mornings I go out and don't see any birds worth shooting. (I could make a career out of shooting mockingbirds, but I'd bore myself to death.) I haven't seen many wading birds in the retention ponds lately. I did hear a hawk this morning, and I knew it was close, but I didn't spot it until it flew out of the tree in front of me!

This shot isn't remarkable, the osprey has its back to the camera. But I was able to get closer than I usually do, and this is a crop, so the eye, the beak and the talons were all points of interest. It was grooming itself, so there wasn't much in the way of a "hero pose."

I miss shooting spiders and dragon flies. There are dragon flies around here, but not usually where I walk. I'd have to go out of my way to find them. I think we've just killed off nearly all the spiders. I'd see hundreds of them a decade ago, giant orb weavers. Nothing today. It's sad.

But I like shooting bluebirds and ospreys and the rest, while we still have them. One day, hopefully not in my lifetime, they'll be gone too.