I've gotten to see some beautiful birds on my lunch breaks and our hikes around the Ormond Wetlands, but this has got to be one of the highpoints of my new birdwatching sightings! After eating my lunch in the parking lot, I walked down to the water and ran into a man who told me he had watched the hawk catch a snake so big the snake had wrapped around the bird's legs and body. He hadn't been sure who was going to win the battle, but by the time I discovered the hawk on my walk, it had bitten the snake's head off and was using its feet to stop the snake's body from continuing to move.
From my vantage point of about twenty-five feet away, the hawk looked to be about 20"-24" tall. The Nikkor 55-200mm digital lens really did the job of catching the beauty and power of this bird! I got a few different shots as I walked by and as the bird took his meal to a couple of different places. Once it started skinning the snake, I went back to work and left the hawk to eat its meal.
Click on the photos to enlarge them; click on the title to see my photo album.
I thought we had lost the black fish that appeared "out of nowhere" last year, but lately I've been noticing extra movement when I fed our goldfish. (Update: Doah! I very vaguely remember buying three or four "feeder fish" for a dollar and think the black fish was one of those.) 
I finally saw a black fish last week and yesterday I caught it with the camera, some shots quite by accident since this fish moves so quickly and is so easily camoflaged.
I've gotten to see some beautiful birds on my lunch breaks and our hikes around the Ormond Wetlands, but this has got to be one of the highpoints of my new birdwatching sightings! After eating my lunch in the parking lot, I walked down to the water and ran into a man who told me he had watched the hawk catch a snake so big the snake had wrapped around the bird's legs and body. He hadn't been sure who was going to win the battle, but by the time I discovered the hawk on my walk, it had bitten the snake's head off and was using its feet to stop the snake's body from continuing to move.
From my vantage point of about twenty-five feet away, the hawk looked to be about 20"-24" tall. The Nikkor 55-200mm digital lens really did the job of catching the beauty and power of this bird! I got a few different shots as I walked by and as the bird took his meal to a couple of different places. Once it started skinning the snake, I went back to work and left the hawk to eat its meal.
Click on the photos to enlarge them; click on the title to see my photo album.
Maybe it was the drought; maybe it was the extreme cold and hot this year, but irises of all kinds bloomed last month. Some of the re-blooming bearded irises that hadn't bloomed well the year or two before, really took off. Some of those had bloomed in the late fall and are beginning to show buds again!
