Well, Maybe a Little

Yesterday’s blog entry was just a ploy to introduce today’s shots from the The Woodland Park Zoo, shots of various birds taken in various places. “Various” because I didn’t have time to find and write down the names of all the birds that I took pictures of because I had to keep up with two five-year olds anxious to see the next great thing, or at least to eat lunch.

It almost seems like heresy to go to a zoo without a child in tow, but I imagine that is precisely what I am going to have to do in the near future. That’s the only way I’ll ever have time to get better shots and to identify the various birds, often found in a mixed group in an open area.

exotic bird

Perhaps the name of the bird is irrelevant, for these birds by any other name would surely be just as beautiful. And it’s hard to imagine anything more bizarre, or more beautiful than this one:

exotic bird

At least until you see the gaudy colors on this bird,

Another Exotic Bird

which, in turn, doesn’t seem to have too much over the North American male Ruddy Duck in full breeding colors, a shot I’ve been trying to capture in the wild for over two years now:

male Ruddy Duck in Breeding Colors

I finally know why they call it a “ruddy duck,” though blue-billed might be even more appropriate.

I still prefer to think I’m not obsessed with birds, but, rather, that I am more aware of them than most people. If I am obsessed with birds, than I’m also obsessed with flowers because I came away with many photographs of them, too, both native and exotic:

Orchid

I like to think I’m obsessed with Beauty and Truth, and, as any Dickinson fan knows, they are One.

Hopefully I can teach my granddaughter to listen and to talk to the birds, too.

Lael and Crow Statues

5 thoughts on “Well, Maybe a Little”

  1. I especially liked the top photo, though the one of your granddaughter is cute. Curly locks.

    I have a Zoo membership and go 2 or 3 times a week, sans kid. I’m doing a study of the chimps and gorillas, and a long, long story, but it’s also good exercise and I love the critters.

    Every once in a while a docent will look at me as if I’m strange, being the only single adult among families and groups of extremely noisy small beings, but I think most are getting to know me by now.

    You know, kids are just as happy with a swing and a ball–it’s adults that need magic.

  2. I’ve noted, Shelley, that kids often are more attracted to the “play area” at zoos than they are to the animals.

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