This is a collection of images from June, none of which has had a posting of its own. Curiously, there are no mammals. Although I saw mammals, none of them produced interesting pictures.
The first shore bird to arrive each year is normally the killdeer, which usually can be seen as early as mid March. Strangely, the first one I saw this year didn’t appear until mid June.
A just fledged dipper chick sits on a log overlooking the creek. It is still too young to feed itself and desperately wants a parent to come along with some food.
With summer, redstarts have flowed into this region. This is a female.
A male Red-winged Blackbird flies past.
While a female Red-winged Blackbird prepares to fly.
The fact that this small creature looks rather like a wasp is a ruse to discourage a bird from eating it. It is actually a harmless little hoverfly collecting pollen from a daisy.
A Bank Swallow leaves its cavity, having fed its chicks, which are, as yet, not visible.
A male Northern Flicker (red-shafted) flies past.
A crab spider waits patiently on a daisy for a meal to arrive in the form of a fly or ant.
A female Common Yellowthroat flits through the brush looking for insects.
The male Common Yellowthroat reveals how the bird was named.
Meow!
As does the Common Yellowthroat, the Warbling Vireo searches for insects to eat.
The Osprey has a blind spot when it comes to property rights. It regularly builds its nest on human-built structures, but then complains bitterly when humans happen to pass by. Its mantra seems to be, if I am here, it is mine.
Wild Turkey presence
When I was a child on the shore of Kootenay Lake, there were no Wild Turkeys to be seen.
Returning to the lakeshore in retirement, I was surprised to see a few. Since that time, the proliferation of turkeys is probably satisfying only to coyotes.
Why are they here? Apparently they were introduced in the states of Washington and Idaho as a way to satisfy hunters. Sigh….
A Washington website states: “wild turkeys … were introduced to Washington beginning in the early twentieth century.” These turkeys apparently did not head north. However, an Idaho website tells us that: “Wild turkey populations have taken off in Idaho since Idaho Fish and Game first introduced them in the 1960s.” It is a portion of this plantation that seems to have sought refuge around Kootenay Lake, for a few were apparently seen around Salmo later in that decade.
However, the purpose of this posting is merely to record a milestone in our history of the Wild Turkey. By an accident of the preservation of ephemera, I have a page from the BC Naturalist from the Spring of 1987 (Vol. 25, No. 1, p. 6) that notes: “West Kootenay Naturalists were excited to find two WILD TURKEYS near Nelson on 27 December.”
This event, over thirty years ago, was an early stage in our turkey infestation, all apparently a consequence of Idaho’s introduction.
