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While deep in the Ochoco Mountains we ran across a nice flowing creek. I love running water and just had to stop!! Upon inspection of where we were it was obvious this spot had been used as a hunting camp. The legs of the elk and the "meat hangers" (we laughed for I am sure there is a real name for them ha) , that were nailed to the trees. The feathers laying around looked as if maybe a turkey was in the mix with the elk? Even a spot for a bathroom. Gave us this impression. Guy wondered further down the creek then I for things happen to catch my eye. So I was wondering around on my own taking shots of the ice that was found where the water was not running fast. As I was doing my thing I heard some racket that was obviously coming from the trees and from birds. As you can imagine wild creatures do not just sit still so one can snap off photographs, so off I went to get this loud birds photographs! There were at least 3 of these birds, however non of them were all that impressed with any of us there! From the information I gathered of this bird, these must of been truly wild Gray Jays!! Not yet ingrained with human presents. I first thought this was a nutcracker. We have many of those around so it seams. Same family as these Gray Jays, but so is the steller's jay,blue jay and the western scrub jay , the crows, the ravens there is a lot of species in the Corvidae family!! From the sub species of the Gray Jay and getting these photographs in the Ochoco mountains this determined these to be the Bicolored Gray Jay. One thing all these birds have in common is, they are very smart!! Smarter then humans give them credit for! Over the Cascade Mountains there is yet another sub species of the Gray Jay over there with different needs and habits. That Gray Jay does not like snow, the ones here better like snow! Like all birds of the Corvidae family, they are pretty much scavengers, however it appears all the species of the Gray Jay have different food s

Sparrow Birds Working For Their Meal . I admit, it is ridiculous the money we spend on the wildlife here. The gardens and such to attract the wildlife so I can photograph them. I justify this expense as entertainment, for really Guy and I can sit for hours just talking and watching all the wildlife we work so hard to attract to our place. We stopped in at the Madras Livestock Auction where they opened up a feed store. We need bird seed in big time bulk. The sparrows are the main birds we feed here, but without the sparrows the other birds would not be attracted. As soon as we walked into the feed store we saw this seedblock. We thought this would slow down the birds a little, making them work for their meal. It has, and offered me a great photography opportunity! We are more than happy to try out such products if, and I mean if, it is cost affective!

For a couple days now this little girl has been showing up. When I first saw her I thought what a funny looking bird. Now that I have watched her for two days now, I feel rather sorry for her. It is our fault these birds are being altered like this, or this is the way I see it. Chemicals are more likely to blame.

An island populated entirely by happy, flightless birds or almost entirely. In this paradise, Red, a bird with a temper problem, speedy Chuck, and...

When I seen this Yellow Head Black Bird I was amazed with the color! I did not know there was such a bird here in Oregon.

Eagle In Waiting For A Meal. I believe this to be a young golden eagle. We came across many birds of prey on our outing Saturday. The electrical pole gives a good reference of how big this bird is. At this time of the year we have many youngsters out and about.

I told my birds as I was taking care of them, cleaning water bowls , food bowls that if they were not going to eat their seed, I could find someone else to eat them real easy! The junkos showed up for this treat!

As I was sitting in my spot watching the birds,butterflies,bees just enjoying the nice weather we have here in the high desert of Oregon I looked over to one of our ponds and seen the swimming young frogs wanting their piece of bread. Well, I can not just feed them one day and not the other right?

I found this Mountain Chickadee watching the horses and I from one of the trees. Several chickadee species are out, this one has the stripes. They eat bugs and seeds and I find they are often with other birds. Cute little guys!! If you would like to hear what this bird sounds like there is a great voice capture at the " allaboutbirds.org " site.

I like birds, always have. You will find I have many shots of birds of all kinds. This golden eagle was a character. First sighting of a golden eagle in the canyon for the both of us here. I noticed the tree he was perched in just did not look right. We were coming up out of the canyon where we were watching the Bald Eagles fish. This golden eagle did come out of no where to check us and the dogs out. Of course my camera was set up for the bald eagles..... This golden eagle really did startle us! This is the first photograph I got of him,

I pay a lot of attention to Ravens. Some of my best photographs came to be because of the ravens. Ravens are really just a big crow. They are a very intelligent bird, which I guess some can argue with. They work as a team. As a family unit and are very bold creature. More than one raven is called "An unkindness of ravens", I can see why because wow can they drive off the biggest of creatures! There are ten species of the Raven with two more that are said to be extinct. The Magpie appears to be tolerated by the Raven, though they too are finally ran off by the bigger Raven. The Magpie we have here are very smart birds, though I really do not "listen" to them as I do the Raven. After seeing the all the Ravens in a small clearing it did not take Guy long to stop the truck and off I went into the brush. Guy seen a little of what the Ravens were doing, this was running off the eagles. There were two eagles. One was a big Golden Eagle, the other was a young smaller Bald Eagle. Many of these two species of eagles are showing up together these days. I have not noticed this in years past, but this year WOW has this been obvious! The Golden Eagle standing on the prey is the first thing we noticed after the Ravens. The prey I could not identify. Did I want to identify it, not really!! It was white and it appeared to have died some time ago. One thing people do not understand about Eagles, the Golden Eagle and the Bald Eagle is, they will take a meal whether they themselves hunted it down, or if it died by some other means. Eagles will do their best to steal prey as well. The species of eagles are opportunists. They can be scavengers. The Raven were doing the best they could to run off the Eagles, but the Golden Eagle was having no part of being ran off by Ravens! The young Bald Eagle was trying to grab some of the meal when I was getting close, but took off up into a tree to watch. These are the photographs of this event.

Osprey Eating His Catch. If you want to see a expert fishing bird, this is it! The bald eagles have been known to steal these ospreys meal so they are always looking out for others to steal it.

Bird Of Prey In Flight.

The Black-headed Grosbeak is the monarch butterflies worst enemy! These are a species of birds who can safely eat the poisonous monarch butterfly. And is happy to do it!

I was watching this Oregon Junko and noticed a seed nearby, glad he did too!

The Dipper is a great bird to find around unpolluted waters. I happened to catch this one along the Metolius River. When these dippers blink their eyes it looks funky with the white feathers, turns their eyes white! These dippers have a extra eye lid to allow them to see underwater. Now that would be rather cool to do! It is said they have scales that close there nose when they go underwater where they get their food at. These are funny to watch, this one just stood there and really did not mind the intrusion. Fact is I walked away before this dipper went away. This dipper new it was safe.

We watched the Bald Eagles fishing for a while. I understand I need a better tele lens than what I have now for such things as this. It will come. I started out from the truck on the road. Looking down into the canyon I was not sure if I wanted to climb down but found myself doing it!! Guy parked the truck basically just on the dirt road. Over to the side the best he could just so if people were around they could get by it. No where to park! Soon Guy and the dogs were coming too, the dogs found me first of course! We all made our way down into the canyon to the water. Not only were the Bald Eagles fishing, other birds were as well. Their were two adult Bald Eagles and a younger Bald Eagle. The younger one kept trying to take the older ones fish! Big fights ensued. If I did have have this stupid tree in my way!! So we moved locations so the tree would no longer be in my way, though we were in full sight of the eagles as well. So the young Bald Eagle took off out of sight. It did appear that the Bald Eagles were curious as to what we were, and why we were there! They checked us out several times. Than the ducks, and other wildlife left. All three Bald Eagles took off to the other side of the canyon and that was that. To my understanding that side of the canyon belongs to the Warm Spring Indian Reservation, though I could be wrong. The older adults perched in the same tree, while the younger one went into a tree where he could hide from our view. We seen some of his white, but he was not to secure as the older ones were about us seeing him! It was pretty obvious that this younger Bald Eagle was not comfortable around people, or what the eagle did not understand. Here are several photographs of one of the older Bald Eagles fishing.

Hawk Shaking Off The Rain. Being in the 40's and raining on us up in the mountains, many of the birds were doing this.

Should I, Or shouldn't I? This little guy was debating whether to jump on the bird feeder or just stay there and hang out.

We went to a marsh Sunday where I found this Mountain Bluebird.