The Eagles of Wabasha

I recently stumbled upon a Twin Cities Photography group through MeetUp.com I went to my first social gathering the other night at a local bar/bowling alley down the road from me. And they happen to have another activity today that I joined in on. Today's meetup was "The Eagles of Red Wing". Red Wing is about an hour and a half from my house and the meet up time was set for 6:45am. Which is why I waited til the last minute to decide if I was going to go or not... that meant I needed to get up at 4:45, which I have a hard enough time making it to work by 8am. But I knew I would be kicking myself if I didn't, and getting up in the morning for something you're excited for isn't that bad. I remember as a kid and having to get drug out of bed for family vacations. Even though I'd be stumbling down the hallway with my pillow in tow, bumping into my zombie brothers, it was still fun knowing we were going on a trip. And that's how this morning was, my alarm went off and I had the familiar feel of "no not again, just a little bit longer" then looked at my alarm and had a weird feeling of "why is my alarm going off at 4:45am?!?" then a happy feeling of "AH yes, I'm going to shoot eagles today" and that got me up real quick. Even though I set all my camera stuff out ready to go the night before, I still managed to take forever and pulled out of the garage at 5:22am, that's twenty two minutes AFTER I was wanting to. But it ended up being perfect timing.

Driving to a photo spot, is much like hunting. I got up before the sun, to be in place before the sun, to 'shoot' these creatures. I changed my mind about wearing my snow pants because I didn't want to be too noisy. It's the excitement of the 'hunt' but unlike hunting my shooting doesn't kill them, but helps preserve their beautiful being :-)

We met at Colvill park in Red Wing.

It was a beautiful calm morning, but the sun never really came out. I actually started to get discouraged because we saw maybe two eagles fly overhead. And they were flying too fast for me to get one and it was too dark for my pictures to turn out.

After a little wait time, about four of us decided to we travel 40 minutes south to another spot called Read's Landing which is just north of Wabasha. We had heard before hand that Colvill Park hasn't had much turn out, but since it was our designated meet spot, we met up there anyway.

Read's Landing was much more successful. (look in the trees)

Granted they were on the other side of the river and my camera lens only reaches so far (it was zoom out in the photo above to give you perspective)... it was still a super fun experience.

They were EVERYWHERE! It was awesome!

The eagles come to Wabasha to eat. When winter comes they head south looking for food and Wabasha is one of the first places they come to with open water. They don't like to go farther than they need to which is why they usually stop here. It is the connection of two rivers which causes the water to remain open. read more

There was a little spot in the water that they kept landing on, probably hunting for fish.

A little later in our watch a crow stole the spot while one was out fishing. I don't think the eagles like this because they kept swarming around it waiting for the crow to leave, it was funny. The crow would not budge.

I call this one FG Eagle, because it reminds me of the Fair Grove Eagles signs all through my high school :-P

After my face was frozen and my index finger went numb, a few of us headed back to our cars and decided to migrate even farther south.

Not much farther, we just went the four miles into the town of Wabasha, near the National Eagle Center. Hoping to get to a narrower spot in the river and get us closer to the eagles.

We saw a few more here

Nearly 100 bald eagles live in the town of Wabasha and can be seen year round.

All adult eagles (both males and females) have white heads and white tales, that they get in their fourth or fifth year of life. read more

It began to snow on us and after over 200 pictures we figured we'd had enough eagle time.

So me and two others walked back into the little town and decided to stop and get some coffee at a little cafe.

We had a nice chat and warmed up. Then we headed our separate directions. I had a 2 hour drive ahead of me so I moseyed on out of Wabasha. I kept my eye to the east looking for birds in the trees and happened upon a few flying near a pull off area, right near where we stopped in Reads Landing.

There he was on the west side of the river just perched up in a tree.

I got closer and closer, I was actually hoping he'd fly away so I could get some close shots of one flying.

But he just sat there, posing for me :-)

Warm Wishes!

Backyard Winter

I was talking to some friends today about gardening and plants. It made me very excited about spring... well about the fact that spring will be here someday, hopefully sooner than later. And I thought about how last spring was my FIRST spring as a homeowner and we got to learn all about gardening and planting things. I wasn't very happy that I didn't have much luck with the bulbs I planted the fall before, and even more upset that I had to wait a WHOLE year to get the chance to watch them come up again. But it's almost here, and I can't wait. I just hope my hydrangeas do better than last year, I'll be sure to water them this summer.

I thought I would get out and get some more pictures of all our snow. A lot of people (those that don't live in Minnesota, or have never visited Minnesota in the winter) don't understand that we have snow ALL winter long, it doesn't melt. It just piles on top of each snowfall, until about mid-March (if we're lucky) it melts away. Granted we do have a few days here and there starting February where it gets above freezing and slowly melts, but it never completely leaves until, well about April.

So here is the grand tour of my winter-fied backyard. Buckle your safety belts, it's a long tour, lol. Harpo has also incorporated this tour into a game "can you find me?"

We keep a path shoveled for harpo and I clean off the steps as well. Although I'm not sure why I try and keep the bottom step clean because it's lower than the snow line.

Harpo has a path going around the back yard in a circle.

Then he has a poop spot back by the side of the garage. Here he is probably saying "hey what are you doing in my poop spot?"

We don't have a gutter on the very backside of the add on room, so lots of icicles tend to form there. It's pretty cool standing in our living room looking at the window on a day like today when it's slowly melting and just watching the water trickle down the icicle.

I pull the patio table up close in hopes to provide Harpo a dry area to wait if he's needing back inside. It's proven to work and he uses it quite often. Here I am having him "stay" for the picture.

I first caught him licking the table. He's a special dog, but we love him :-)

That concludes the backyard tour, whew it was lengthy huh?

Look at this cool ice sculpture formation that is being made on our porch

Pretty interesting how it does that.

And in closing, I have one more bit of news to share

I mailed my certificate to register my business name :-D

Warm Wishes!

Where have I been?

Sorry I have been neglecting my blog lately. I guess I just haven't really had anything exciting to blog about.

I've been knitting more lately, keeping up with my CSI's AND working on my photography business. Oh boy, I just said it... business.

It's been a lot of talk lately, business that is, between Kyle and I. And it's starting out slow, which is the best way to start I hear. There are a lot of pieces involved, which I guess I never really thought of until, well until I found out. I have been spending some time fixing up my photography blog, which is serving as my main website for now. Go ahead check it out if you'd like: daisyjane photography Once/If things get rolling I plan to have a 'real' website, not just this free blogger stuff... which btw I do love! But I hope to eventually have a photography website to showcase my business better. It just seems so funny to call it that since, well it's fun and I enjoy doing it.

But don't worry I won't neglect my daily blogging life... (haha as if there are actually people reading this) well that is if I ever get a life :-P but I'm sure as soon as spring arrives I'll have lots more exciting things to share. For now, it's just a snow covered, white world out there.



Warm Wishes!

Week 26

#176: Chicken in a Biskit: It had been FOREVER since I had had Chicken in a Biskit.. honestly they weren't as good as I remember them being as a child. But hey it was the super-bowl and we were entitled to eat junk. Although my stomach felt like crap that evening from eating bad.

#177: Snow boots: Living in Minnesota means having shovel snow a LOT in the winter. We got about 6 inches this day, and it was still falling as I was shoveling.

#178: Clock: I just couldn't think of anything to take a picture of this day and I knew I wanted some shapes to fit this weeks theme... so I settled for this clock we have on our bookshelf.

#179: On the move Harpo: I had some other photos for this day, but I couldn't NOT choose this one. It shows Harpo's personality so well when he's having fun! He loves running all over the living room, on the floor on the couch, on the floor, making circles, it's pretty funny.

#180: Lunch: Very exciting lunch this day, lol. I ran out of cheese singles for my normal turkey sandwich so I improvised and made a turkey 'wrap' with string cheese.

#181: Valentines Day Flowers: Kyle brought me home a lovely arrangement for valentines day!! I got to practice my old floral arranging skills, not sure how much I learned from those classes years ago.

#182: I had a maternity shoot this day. The trees were absolutely gorgeous this morning. The fog from the night before left a beautiful white coating of frost on everything. Great timing for a photo shoot.

Warm Wishes!

Winter Bordom

I've been 'bored' a lot lately. Not sure why cuz I seem to keep myself busy. Whether it's knitting, keeping up with television shows, playing on the computer, reading blogs, taking pictures, reading books, or trying to work out. I still feel like I have a lot of free time.

I also feel like I'm running low on ideas for my 365 project. Hence this weeks selection you will see this weekend.

But today I wanted to share with you my new invention, not like it hasn't been made before... but I don't think I have ever made it before. I give you the Turkey WrapUp:

We need to go grocery shopping this weekend. I actually did have bread this day, but no cheese slices. So I improvised by tearing a piece of string cheese in two and using a fajita wrap instead of bread :-)

Sometimes it helps just to spice things up in life :-P