and a strong cup of coffee

I woke up very early on our first full day in Grand Lakes Stream ( I think it was because I knew that we were going to spend the day with Robin) but I snuck out of the cabin and onto the dock to take photos of the sunrise.  I have not doctored any of these photographs and they are in chronological order... it is just that spectacular!

From the dock and our porch window, we could see all kinds of great bird sightings.  I wrote about the osprey here but wanted to share a few more pictures: Loon Loon A pair of loons hanging out near the dock Anyone know what kind of bird this is? The nesting pair of osprey at sunrise

We were hanging out at the dock at Chet's Camps when we heard squawking and saw this osprey flying and swooping and seeming to taunting the two loons that were in front of us.  The osprey has what looked like bass in its talons. Osprey landing with a fish in its talons Looks like the osprey caught a bass

I am now going to be stalking the trail camera pictures and probably trying to put out more as the summer goes on.  This is a new buck - a little smaller than the earlier one that I posted which means that at least a couple of them made it through the winter and with the amount of does that are around, I would say that we have a pretty healthy deer herd hanging around! Look at those pedicals

I would love to find the owner of this track! Deer hair in their travel paths As much of a pain as mud season it, it is a great way to see where the deer are and how big some of them are getting.  It is almost like snow because it gives you a great idea of what is traveling through. I was very happy to see all of the deer tracks but then I saw this one.  It wasn't as fresh as some of the deer tracks but it wasn't too old either.  Looks like I am hunting something besides deer and turkey this year. Good size coyote track

Did you see the camo's critter?  Here are some better photos of him. He still has white on his back feet and belly but the majority of him is brown now.  I hope he sticks around for a while - without eating all of the plants.

I spy with my little eye... I snapped a few pictures of this critter as it scurried across the lawn.  It was hard to see when he was in the brush but I got a few good ones when he came back out onto the lawn and again the next morning.

I convinced Dad to put the trail camera back out at the Sky Condo to see what deer are around and made it through the winter... and it was like seeing old friends. Five healthy looking deer! Last year's fawns look good as yearlings If you zoom in, you can see antlers beginning.  This is one of those 8-pointers! It is always great to see the healthy does and in some shots, one looks like she could be pregnant but what I loved was the picture above that shows antlers beginning.  Looking at his body size and shape, I do believe that this is the smaller of the two 8-pointers.  We are keeping these cameras rolling, but in the three days that we had it out, we had almost 450 picture of the deer as they walk through and eat at some of the grass that is beginning to grow. Could this be the year that I land one of the big ones?  Who knows, but at least I know that it's an option.