Amazing Week for Wildlife

I'm the first to admit that I'm a plant geek. Spring is one of my favorite times of year because there is so much going on in the plant world, and there are new flowers popping up everywhere I look.

In the past few days, however, the animal kingdom has completely stolen my attention, as I have had three days of somewhat remarkable animal sightings. Below are pictures from walks that I've taken over the past three days. (Thanks to my parents for getting me a camera with an awesome zoom on it for Christmas!)

The first picture is of a bat. The kids from our last school group were actually the ones to spot this. It was hanging on a small tree near the pond.

Since I was down at the pond, I took a few minutes to enjoy the view. I spotted what looked like a bird sitting out on a rock across the pond, so I used my camera zoom to let me get a better look. Imagine my surprise when I discovered it wasn't just a Cormorant, but also a giant snapping turtle! (Liz, our resident turtle expert, tells me that snapping turtles don't bask in the sun the way other turtle species do, so we don't know what this turtle was doing there. Snappers do come out of the water to lay eggs--more on that in a moment--but a rock in the middle of the pond is an unlikely nesting spot.)

Next I headed over to the other side of the point, to see if there was anything interesting going on in that bay. As I walked, a bird suddenly flew up out of the grass. I took a peek where the bird had been, and there was this nest! Based on the quick glance I got at the bird and the appearance of the eggs, I think that these are sparrow eggs.

Sadly, the next day when I went back to check on the nest, this was all I found...from what I read online, sparrows do not usually build their nests on the ground, and I guess this shows us why. Some animal had torn the nest up from where it was hidden in the grass and eaten all of the eggs.

I mentioned before that snapping turtles come up out of the water to lay their eggs. Here's a picture of one that I found beside the pond. (To help you get a sense of scale, I would estimate that it was almost three feet long, nose to tail.) If you're around water at this time of year, watch out for the snappers!

Red-wing Blackbirds have been active in the marshy areas around the edge of the pond. This photo gives you a glimpse of the distinctive red and yellow markings on the wing, which are most visible when the bird is in flight.

I also got to see a woodpecker on one of my walks. He wasn't easy to get a good look at (and even harder to get a good picture of), but I think that this is a male Hairy Woodpecker.

This last animal was kind enough to sit and pose for the camera! It seems like everywhere I go lately, there are dozens of chipmunks scurrying around, chirping at annoyance at me for daring to walk through their territory.

Obviously, there is a lot going on in the natural world right now, so I encourage you to go out and take a walk to see what you can find. Even if you don't see any animals, there are plenty of flowers out there that are very good at holding still so that you can get a good look at them!