Birds, A Dog, and Dragonflies

Here are photos from an outing this week to Magnuson Park, plus a few shots from my own backyard.

At the park, Truman and I went at lunchtime for a picnic.  We were serenaded as we ate by this Spotted Towhee.

Truman found Lake Washington enticing, as always.

Sunny summer days, especially mid-day, are great for watching dragonflies.  We visited the ponds over at the wetlands restoration site to see them.

This first one is a Western Forktail, one I hadn't seen before (though fairly common).

The rest I've seen many times, very common around our ponds and lakes.  This is one of my favorites, the Eight-Spotted Skimmer.

The Blue-Eyed Darners refused to land for a photo, so I tried to capture one in flight -- very tricky because of the way they zig and zag so quickly.

The last one is the most brilliantly colored dragonfly I've seen -- a Cardinal Meadowhawk.

On the same pond was a juvenile Pied-billed Grebe.

Back home in my garden, in the late afternoon, an Anna's Hummingbird was hovering -- I managed to get this backlit photo:

Also in the back garden, a pair of Bewick's Wrens have been feeding two juveniles who are full grown now and flying about, but still demanding to be fed.  This is one of the youngsters:

Today the forecast is for sunshine and 75 degrees -- I hope to get some sketching done before it gets too warm.