This is a collection of images from this February, none of which has had a posting of its own.
The Rough-legged Hawk is a winter resident that hunts for rodents.
Our smallest falcon, the kestrel, hunts in open habitats.
I don’t have a bias that favours sighting birds. Yet, notwithstanding the skunk seen earlier, most of the creatures I see are avian. Hiding in the forest is a White-tailed Doe in its winter pelage.
This is one of two Ruffed Grouse that frequent my yard.
A Bald Eagle added a branch to the pair’s nest. Eagles have a compulsion to add material each year, and sometimes this results in a nest so massive that it topples the tree.
The Song Sparrow is a common bird, but drabness renders it inconspicuous. It deserves to be celebrated now and then.
The robin is also common, yet has a greater cachet and so does not require the same acknowledgment as the Song Sparrow. Here are four robins in a larch.
This has been an really good winter for seeing Trumpeter Swans. Indeed, many pictures I have taken of them have just been discarded. Yet, I rather like this shot taken in the dim light of dawn.
This is a male goldfinch in non-breeding plumage. The black feathers on the finch’s head are a sign of pending spring as it moults into its breeding plumage of a black cap and a yellow body.
And this cutie is a female goldfinch.
Stuck cat
This blog does not usually concern itself with domestic animals, but this seemed special: a stuck cat. It was beside the highway and high on some utility cables about a third of the way between the poles. Presumably it had been chased up a pole.
The cat has now been there for over three hours, during which time, it has moved no more than a couple of centimetres. Below it, the berm to the road is quite narrow, so the cat will be difficult to rescue. Indeed, someone watching the cat got stuck, and now that person needs to be rescued. Then, that person’s rescuer got stuck. The cat continued to sit on the cables watching the cascade of getting stuck.
The story is ongoing.