Off On An Owl Hunt

 Hi everyone. Happy Friday. Another week of January has flown by. The cold has arrived in New Hampshire also.  Maddie's doggy-daycare does a countdown until spring, and today we have 60 days until that season begins. Boy that seems like a long time, and I hope it doesn't stay this chilly for most of those days. 

I am linking today's post up to Nicoles' Friday Face Off and also to Gillena's Friday Lunch Break.

Having been sick and then starting to feel better, by last Friday I  was ready to go somewhere different.  A friend and I went to Salisbury State Beach Reservation in Salisbury, Massachusetts. We were looking for snowy owls, even though this year none have been reported in the area. We were hopeful there could be one because you never know after a storm or two what gets blown into the area. Even though there were no owls, it was a beautiful March like day, and we saw lots of other interesting things, as well as taking a nice walk.

One thing we saw were some cool rusting posts and purple sand.

Since the tide was on its way out, the seals were around also. There were a LOT of them, and although none of them came onto the shore, they were having fun playing in the water, leaping out of the water, and then taking a sun bath on a rock that was becoming exposed. I could have watched them for hours. 😏

And besides seals, we saw a few birds too. 

We had a couple of up close encounters with hawks. I'm not very good at hawk identification, but I think this first one is a reed-tailed hawk. (Even though my Merlin app suggested it was a snowy owl-NOT!)

And the second hawk was hard to ID as the sun's direction was  making it hard to see any details.

I lightened  up the photo quite a bit to get a good look at the face, and I think it's a northern harrier. (I know both of these hawk species were spotted at the reservation that day  by some expert birders as seen on ebird lists. I love birds but I am no expert birder; I'm happy just to see what I come across and then try to ID them if I don't know what they are.)

This pair of mallards did a great job of camouflaging in the dried grass. If the drake hadn't been moving, I don't think we would have seen them.

However, this younger ring billed gull (I think) was all about showing off for us. 

I'm about as good at duck identification as I am  at hawk identification, but I believe these are female  common eiders.

And here's a few more waterfowl faces for  you.

And I'll finish this post with a few other views.

I'll leave you with this little T. rex or close relative  that somehow escaped extinction 65 million years ago. 😁

Have a great end of your week. And stay warm (and dry) if you're in the cold or snow/ice.