Taking Off

We made it through another Christmas season, with an annual trip to my folks house, a visit with Dino's sisters and an interesting side trip to see the USS Iowa in Richmond.  As it was Christmas Day itself, we weren't able to take the tour, but instead peered through a chain link fence for what turned out to be a pretty good view of it. 

These paperwhites bloomed a couple of days after Christmas; they were a gift from my sister and they are still blooming!

Dino has been super busy the past weeks what with participating in Christmas Bird Counts (Oakhurst, Mariposa and Merced) and working on the kestrel project.  That is shaping up very nicely, it looks like, with a number of possible areas surveyed and assessed.  Dino is in the stage of receiving approvals and permissions and is confident that a decent number of nest boxes will be built and put in place for this year's nesting season.  We'll be putting some on our property as well for the kestrel population of this area.

This beautiful photo of a juvenile Red-tailed Hawk was taken by Dino on the Merced bird count.