Today's walk report: 060522

 Dusty's Day.

I swear, I looked for other photo ops but male Calypte anna hummingbird Dusty was so obliging and not much else was presenting itself to me as particularly photo worthy in the time I had allotted so... Dusty is the star of the day! Another thing, about male Calypte anna hummingbirds, they will get to know you and become more comfortable with your presence than other hummingbirds. At least this is true of hummingbirds native to me. I've had good relationships with Selasphorus sasin (Allen's) hummingbirds too but they took a lot longer and there was never quite the same amount of rapport as I've had with male Calypte anna birds. Here are today's pictures...

First, I need to point out, I think I mis-ID'd this cactus genus yesterday. I wrote, Echinopsis. I think it's actually Cereus, specifically, Cereus stenogonus. If I'm still wrong, well, that's okay. Please keep in mind while I value nomenclature accuracy to a certain degree, I mostly don't care. I do care about the photos though.

Back to Dusty, he was very busy defending his territory today. There were several intruders this morning including another younger male Calypte anna. For the most part the territorial defense activity was more fun to watch with the camera down. Dusty typically took his breaks in a usual spot right in front of me and that's when clicks took place.

This is the young Calypte anna male intruder, hogging the Salvia darcyi flowers.

However, at least for awhile, Dusty remained rather chill about the whole thing.

Docken and I were on the phone again (thank you, Dockie) and she mentioned going up the hill, so I drove up the hill. Yes, weekends have become a drive/walk thing but let me point out I also have been going for early evening walks. Anyway, up the hill I'm seeing a lot of cars en-route. Turns out there was what appeared to be some sort of graduation pomp and circumstance at the theater on the top of the hill. I spent a fair amount of time strategizing how I was going to avoid people and also explore the hilltop. I did okay, however, this was the only event worthy of camera clicks for me... another battle between red-tailed hawks (two) and an American crow (one). I saw a higher level of aggression than I've typically witnessed from the hawks. One hawk was talons down above the crow several times. The right wing on that hawk looked like it may have seen some battles before. I will note, this area is near a spot where I've known red-tailed hawks to have nests for years. The tallest trees on the campus are down below. I'm pretty sure the crow was the intruder but it can go either way.

Here's the veteran hawk.

I wandered around a bit after this but once the birds left and people were becoming more plentiful I decided it was time to journey home and have some breakfast