Earlier this week I felt the need to be in the woods, so I grabbed my camera and my new lens and went out early to see what I could see.

Near the park entrance it seemed obvious that Mrs. Osprey didn’t want her picture taken as she sat low in her nest so I moved along.

Gotta respect a mother’s wishes.

As I walked toward the nature center and the beginning of the trails I realized I hadn’t thought to bring the birds anything to eat.

Well, I thought, they’d have to get over it.

I hadn’t taken into account I was the first car in the parking lot and that it had been raining for two days so people hadn’t visited these hungry birds in awhile. I was instantly attacked by an angry mob of red winged blackbirds as I rounded the corner. I heard their wings first and then felt one bounce off my head. Then another. They were everywhere.

I thought I was in a movie, and not in a good way.

I swatted some of them away and moved faster down the trail, blackbirds following closely.

I had managed to get out into the marsh, with only a few blackbirds circling my head, when I heard a Baltimore oriole singing his heart out.

He seemed to be celebrating the sun as he sang in the morning light.

As he sat there singing he began to preen, as if he was singing in the shower.

He was fun to watch and the blackbirds got bored and headed back up the trail to wait for their next victim. They could only hope that person wasn’t such an airhead.

Though the blackbirds had given up, other birds had not. A little titmouse quietly asked if it was true, that there was no food.

I felt bad, but I had to tell him the truth. I had forgotten his breakfast. I was amazed at how quickly he abandoned me, once he realized I was a waste of time.

I wandered off to look for other pretty things to photograph. I figured it probably wouldn’t be a bird kind of day given I was a bird feeder failure.

I felt lucky that the iris was in bloom and so very beautiful.

But while I was focused on the iris, my eyes glued to the viewfinder trying to get just the right composition, I heard wings again. And again I felt something largish bounce off the top of my head.

The male red-bellied woodpecker was miffed that I wasn’t offering anything to eat. And he wasn’t afraid to tell me off either.

I told him I was sorry, but I didn’t bring anything. And I went back to photographing the iris.

Off to the right of me I heard a big uproar. Turns out Mrs. Red-bellied wasn’t happy either.

I wasn’t sure if she was mad at me for forgetting or him for being a bad provider. Either way she wasn’t getting anything to eat. He jumped to and got to work finding her something…anything!

He looked everywhere.

How about some nice lichen, sweetie?

In between his forages for something natural to feed his demanding wife (who kept on complaining. Loudly.) he’d come back and dive bomb me for being such a disappointment. I kept looking for pretty things to photograph.

He followed me almost all the way around a big loop, complaining and doing flybys. Eventually I moved out of his range and settled into a more peaceful walk.

Of course most of the other inhabitants of the woods were equally stressed by my lack of responsibility. I promised them I would never ever forget to bring their snacks again.

I probably should just pack a snack bag for them and leave it in my car to be more prepared in the future.

Feeling remorseful I headed over to the heron rookery to see what was new. I figured the herons wouldn’t be mad at me given I never feed them.

But I’ll tell you all about that in the next post. I have to say a couple of my favorite images happened over there!

So when I left you last I had backed away from a crane scuffle and had resigned myself to photographing plants. But I really wanted to get great shots of birds.

I was feeling discouraged.

I moved slowly through the wetlands, enjoying the wildflowers but keeping my ears open for bird calls. Eventually I made my way back into the woods where the light was dim but a few birds were happily fliting around.

I felt a bit of hope. I decided that every trip out to this park taught me more about photography and even if I didn’t get my dream shot, the experience of just being in the woods was worth all the blurry bird images I was likely to capture.

I walked slowly, and didn’t offer any birds seed from my hand unless they were obviously asking for something. It was late morning and most of them would have finished their breakfasts long before I showed up.

In fact everything seemed pretty quiet.

I used the Merlin app on my phone to listen for any interesting birds. I wasn’t hearing very much.

Then I remembered that I was going to try and stand still and wait while I was out in the woods. That moving around, even slowly, made most of the animals and birds skitter away.

So I stood.

And very soon, flying fast up the path at the level of my head, was a male red-bellied woodpecker.

I offered him something from my hand, but he wasn’t having it. He was, however, obviously wanting something to eat. So I tossed a peanut onto the trail behind me and immediately, even before the peanut hit the ground, he was on it.

And so was his youngster, waiting to be fed. They were in the shadows so the image of him feeding the young one is grainy. But it was so cool I wanted you to see it anyway.

Then they both flew up into the tree, dad on the front to ask for more food, and junior on the backside waiting for his free meal.

Poor dad worked so hard. He’d grab something from the trail where I tossed it and fly to a tree where two young woodpeckers noisily followed him. I don’t think he got anything to eat himself.

The trio followed me for a good quarter mile. He’d zoom past my head and land on a tree trunk, and I’d toss him something that he’d take to his two freeloading kids.

Meanwhile other birds were gathering to watch. There was a young nuthatch who would have enjoyed an oiler, but was afraid to enter the fray.

And a disgruntled blue jay.

And overseeing it all, strangely quiet, was the neighborhood blackbird.

Eventually I got away from the family of woodpeckers and started seeing other little birds.

It was getting toward noon, the sun directly overhead, and most of the birds were settling down.

They weren’t hungry, but if I was still I could see them tucked in among the branches.

I figured it was time to head back to car. I could use a snack myself.

But on my way back to the car my Merlin app said there was a common yellowthroat nearby. And guess what? I found him!

And just up the trail, hopping around in a cedar tree was a female common yellowthroat! I’ve never seen one before, it was so exciting!

But what about the yawning cardinal, you ask? Oh yes, he was settling down for a nap in a bush when I walked by.

I guess I was boring. Or maybe he was just too sleepy to be polite.

Oh, and on the drive out of the park I stopped to watch the osprey and her 3 young.

It turned out to be a spectacular day. And I learned more about photographing birds. I can’t wait to get out there to try again.