Beauties and a Beast

This was a cloudy, cool week with little opportunity for pictures. These guys showed up and brightened my day.Stopping the wings of the hummingbird takes around an eight hundredth of a second.
This guy dropped rather clumsily on our carport while I was taking the pictures of the hummingbirds. This young Cooper's Hawk along with his parents devastated our song bird population. They are protected so we have to wait till they get tired of our campground or the bird population is gone.

He looks a little disheveled in the wind...

But he is a fine looking raptor even if he is a stinker.

Another Week at the Lake

Things are starting to look like summer after a slow start for the flowers. Our front yard with the laundry drying in the background .The back side... not much to see with the strong shadows.
A kayak picture of a Heron sunning himself.

This is the view from one end of the lake to the other... it is about 500 acres and 75-80 feet deep at the deepest.

Have spent a little time with neighbors around a fire....

Good friends from GF spent a couple of days and even...

let me get in one of the pictures.

This last picture is of the Cooper's Hawk in the campground (now there are three) that has been munching on the song birds and generally making a nuisance of themselves. He let me get close to his lunch but flew seconds after I got this one. He usually dines in the trees. A lot of talk about how to get rid of them but none legal so far... any ideas?

Five for the Fourth

The Fourth brought three visitors from Iowa to Eagle Lake. Here Zach and Grandpa Lou are cooling their heels.There was the usual picnic of burgers, p-salad, and beans....
A "huge" parade of golf carts through the camp grounds...

An unexpected float plane giving rides to the adventurous...

And the Pink Lady Slippers finally made an appearance just in time for the Fourth.

Here is an Iowa boy showing off his curly hair.

And what ten year old can resist walking across the Mississippi?

Momma duck was on parade with her brood.

And Zach got a chance to fly over the water on a tube and a wing. Great fun....