Birding Aint Easy

Another day another goose chase. I got up at 5:00am to head up to Western Massachusetts in search of one of my two goal birds this year, the Bald Eagle (Pileated is my 2nd). I was rearing to go and drove an hour and fifteen minutes to catch a glimpse of the magnificent bird.

I got to where I was supposed to go and there was nothing but quiet.......No bird song at all or other wild life for that matter. I decided to drive around some more and covered about 10 miles of prime birding spots to not see anything. Suddenly I drove past a man in his car with one of those fancy scopes attached to his camera. HA! I thought to myself, finally some potential. It was obvious this guy was a hard core birder with equipment as fancy as that!!! I waited for him to get his pictures and then drove past stretching my neck at what it was he was photographing and figuring out how I could get in on the action too. Guess what it was......Go Ahead..........A Titmouse and a squirrel. SOB!! If I take one more titmouse picture I am going to scream seriously I am. That there was a sure sign to me that the place was indeed dead if this serious birder was taking photos of these two.

Driving back and very disappointed I decided to stop at a cemetery in Worcester. The Canada geese were at this one too. No other birds were there except for crows and mallard ducks. Same as always. I feel as if I am in my own movie version of Groundhog Day here.

Still unwilling to give up I went to the bike trail in my town. It was there that I saw the blue heron in the top photo. I have NEVER been able to get a closeup of this bird because it is too skittish. I approached it slowly and took pictures and it didn't move which was very puzzling to me.

I also got this picture of crows stalking yet another hawk. I seriously think the crows enjoy this as it seems as if they do this whenever I venture outside. I know the picture isn't good but can someone tell me if this is a red-tailed hawk? I am trying to get better with hawk identification but need confirmation please.

Lastly a picture of wild turkeys in Belchertown. The only bird picture I was able to get while in Western Mass.

While driving home I came to the conclusion that birding isn't easy. I spend countless hours every week chasing after birds only to see the same ones I see every week. You would think this would discourage me enough to stop for a while but I can't. I have already scoped out where I will be headed to tomorrow!