Monday, November 7, 2011

Looking for Snow Geese

There has been a huge, I mean enormous, flock of Snow Geese gathering west of Estevan.  The numbers are easily in the 150K+ range - and the flock was growing as smaller flocks dropped down to rest and graze.  The parcel of land they were grazing had been seeded with a cover of what looked like a cereal grain and mustard.  (I seriously don't know my crops any more).  Anyway, it was fresh greens coming up.  Very alluring for hungry, migrating geese.

I tried to get photos.  This is maybe one-fifth of the flock, the ones closest to the road that rose up as I stopped my vehicle


Then I continued my drive to Torquay and north.  I saw four moose skulking around an abandoned farm yard.  They saw me as well.  By the time I turned around, the moose were at full gallop across a summerfallow field.



They look slightly out of place on the flatlands, don't they?


There is still so much water around here, as evidenced by this old stand of trees that's been drowning since April.


Continuing on to the Mainprize Bridge over Rafferty Reservoir.  A few fishermen were along the banks on one side.  The choppier side had a few Northern Shovellers and two juvenile Western Grebes


The shovellers were really liking whatever greeny, grungy, algal stuff is in the water. 


Onward to Midale.  A Common Raven (they were as uncommon in this area as moose  when I was growing up - now ravens are everywhere, especially in the winter).


A lingering Great Blue Heron at a farm dugout.


A huge Charolais bull


An oilwell - it's called Mixed Farming over here.




8 comments:

  1. Looks like you had quite an adventurous day. I must say I really like your photographs. Composition seems to come naturally to you.
    Give Freddie a few tosses of his great new toy for me.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks for the fall pix K. Yes the moose look out of place without a forest backdrop.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thanks, Brett. I like driving around taking phots. Will do re playing with Freddie

    ReplyDelete
  4. Brian, honestly, 'Moose at Torquay' just doesn't compute. There have been 3-4 around for quite a few years.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Nice drive with wonderful pictures to boot. I once saw a river of snow geese, perhaps a million, from horizon to horizon crossing Nebraska.

    ReplyDelete
  6. We seem to be seeing more moose on the prairie. It used to be something you didn't think about driving highway 41 to Saskatoon, but moose are a real concern for night driving now.

    Nice job on the backlit portrait of the Charolais.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Troutbirder, would that be the Platte River? I want to get down there to see the Sandhill Crane collection in the Spring (one of these years...)

    ReplyDelete
  8. Thanks, Scott. A collision with a moose would be dreadful. A friend & I drove through Riding Mtn Nat'l Park in Manitoba late evening a few years ago. It was scary as suddenly a huge bull moose would trot out onto the road in front of the car. It took forever to get through the park as we reduced speed to the point I probably could have walked faster! But, we escaped without hurting car or animals.

    ReplyDelete