A Sunday afternoon of Irish music

Pam and I went to an Irish bar in Bethesda yesterday because a friend of mine was playing there.

The band is Swampoodle, named after an Irish neighborhood in DC that once was in the area where Union Station now stands. The show was a fundraiser for next year's St. Patrick's Day Parade, and it was the band's first public performance. My friend Dan Costello is on the left playing the accordion in the above photo.

The afternoon's entertainment also included Irish dancers, and below is a shot of some of the younger dancers:

This last picture is another one of the band when Dan put down the accordion and played guitar. He sang on this song and also played harmonica on a few numbers. The songs were a mix of Irish and rock.

We were joined by some other friends: Dan Porter and Eric Rickford. The beer was good and the food acceptable. Everyone had a good time.

Neighborhood Fox

For the past few months we've often seen a fox in our yard, next door, or across the street. Today our neighbor Jim called to say that the fox was relaxing in our back yard.

It seemed perfectly at home laying in the bright winter sun. The fox scratched a lot, and when it left we noticed that its tail was not full and fluffy, a sign that it probably has mange.

Pond after a late January snow

Bald Eagle Sighting

At one point during yesterday's walk, I heard what sounded like a hawk. I was along the Paint Branch trail, and shortly after hearing that sound I saw a hawk-like bird flying away from me towards the stream. A few minutes later as I continued my walk, I looked up to see a very large bird perched high in a tree, and the bird's head was clearly white. I believe the bird was a bald eagle.

The Chesapeake Bay is one of the areas of the country where bald eagles are commonly found, and I remember seeing one years ago sitting in a tree along a highway. That sighting was to the east, so it was much closer to the Bay than Silver Spring, but I have heard from a knowledgeable source that eagles sometimes nest this far from the Bay. That source was a ranger at Triadelphia Reservoir who described to a friend and myself the location of an eagle's nest, and I believe we spotted it while canoeing that day.

After walking out of sight of the eagle yesterday, I once again heard hawk-like calls which seemed to come from different directions at the same time, making me wonder if there were two birds. I circled around in the woods to retrace my steps in hopes of getting another sighting, and this time I saw sitting on a tree limb a smaller hawk whose head wasn't white.

I consulted some of our bird books when I got home, and I think that I saw two Bald Eagles. The second smaller eagle was likely an immature bird. I'll never know for certain if I'm right about what I saw, but that's my story. On the way home I stopped to take this photo of the pond:

The Park: January 19, 2019

 

 

House: January 19, 2019

Got a couple of more inches of snow the night before.

Tuesday's view of frozen pond

Sunday's snow

Snow started Saturday night and continued until it totaled 8-10 inches. Went walking Sunday afternoon while it was still coming down.

Calm morning at the pond

Maryland basketball last night

They beat Radford.

Anthony Cowen shooting free throws:

Annual Christmas tree picture

Pond iced over during a cold week

 

I took this picture on Monday when the pond was about 3/4 ice. Other mornings during the week it was almost completely ice, but by Friday the temperatures warmed up and the rains came, enough rain to make 2018 the rainiest year on record.

Swan visits pond

Saturday I watched a large white bird land in the pond, and my first thought was that it was a mute swan, a species I knew to be considered an invasive nuisance in Maryland.

 

 

I continued to follow the swan around the pond and took a number of pictures with my phone. Soon I noticed two large yellow tags with inscriptions on them. I'm not certain how well these tags show up in these photos.

 

 

When I got home I spent time on the Maryland Department of Natural Resources website to learn about swans. Apparently, some tundra swans also winter here, and the two species look very much alike. Googling swan tagging brought me to a website in Ontario, Canada that described an effort to reintroduce the trumpeter swan which had once been common throughout North America but whose numbers had been to reduced to only a few because of market hunting. According to the website the Canadian group used tags which were described as looking exactly like the tags I had seen on the swan in the park.

 

 

I returned to the pond twice in the afternoon, and looking through binoculars I could make out the letter "T" and the number "8" on the yellow tag. There was a third number or letter which was obscured by the bird's feathers.

 

 

I spent much of the day looking through the bird books we have, and although the three species of swans look much alike I believe this was a trumpeter based partially on the dark beak and size of the bird but most importantly on its yellow tags. Based on what I've read I believe the swan's presence in Maryland is unusual because most of the trumpeter swans in the U.S. are out west in Wyoming and Montana.

 

After my initial sighting I e-mailed the Ontario website to tell them of the swan sighting in Maryland. If they answer my e-mail I'll tell them about the letter and number I saw. The swan was still there at the pond Sunday morning but flew away as I watched with my friend Stan. I haven't seen it since.



Thanksgiving 2018

For years we've been sharing our holiday with my sister's in-laws, the Powell family. This year Dan Powell, my sister's nephew, with his wife Azelin hosted Thanksgiving at their new home in Monrovia, Maryland. A very nice affair.

 Greg and Pam are second and third on the right. I'm in back also on the right where if you look hard you can see a white head of hair tilted back to get in the picture.

Plucky little ducky

The water fowl in the park pond consists mainly of Canada Geese and Mallards, but in the colder months sometimes something different appears and hangs around for a while. This small diving duck showed up about two weeks ago, and the closest I can get to identifying it is a lesser scaup. I've poured through bird books because I'm not satisfied with that answer.

I was thinking today about why I find this duck so fascinating. Part of it is that it's something different, but it's also because he's small and alone.

The picture above gives some indication of how small this guy is. I should say "gal" because it's probably female. She's on the left and is dwarfed by the three Canada Geese. On the upper right are two Mallards behind a fourth goose.

On my walk this morning

As usual, went by the pond first. Autumn color came late this year, and I suspect the leaves may not be around long.

I then walked down to Paint Branch Creek.

 

I climbed the hill and took a picture down at the creek:

Some trees along the trail:

Autumn Leaves

When the obvious title for a post of these two pictures occurred to me, the song with the same name also popped into my head. Now I continue to hear that old standard in my mind. Oh, well. As ear worms go, this one is pretty good.

Wild surf following the storm

A storm blew up the coast Friday night, and we heard the wind howl in the dark. Although there's no scale on the picture to give a sense of the height of the in-coming surf, I estimated the waves to be between 8 and 10 feet on Saturday, and they probably much higher the previous night.

The picture does show, however, the spray from the pounding waves.

 

I don't know where along the beach the surfers were on Saturday, but they showed up Sunday.

 

 

 

Weekend at Bethany Beach

We arrived at the beach early Friday afternoon, and I immediately took a walk:

Back at the Addy Sea, the bed and breakfast which we always use for our short stays, I took this picture of Pam on the porch:

 

 

Autumn foliage is late this year

This picture was taken last week when normally the fall colors would be reaching their "peak". Global climate change is probably the cause.

We also got a visit from this great blue heron which are not as common on our pond as they are on other neighboring waterways.

Catch-up #6: Misty Morning at the Pond

This picture was taken yesterday. This is the last of the catch-up posts:

Catch-up #5: Football

The University of Maryland won against Bowling Green.

Catch-up #4: Golden Rod at the Pond

The picture was taken in mid-September.

Catch-up #3: Baseball

I went to a Nationals game with neighbor Jim in September. I don't remember who we played, but I believe the Nats lost.

Catch-up #2: Pam and I at Bethany Beach

We were on our way to dinner one night, and son-in-law Sean noticed that the lighting was good for pictures. Also, we were dressed up for than we usually are during our beach week which this year was the last week in August.

I in turn took a picture of Sean and Rebecca:

 

 

Catch-up #1: Backyard flowers

This is the first of six posts that represent an effort to make up for almost three months when I didn't post on this blog. I could excuse the inactivity due to obligations, but actually it was mostly laziness.

This backyard photo was taken in mid-August:

Jazz at Riverdale Mansion

The mansion was built in the early 1800's by members of the Calvert family, the family responsible for the settling of Maryland, and other prominent political families lived there at various times. The photo below I took from the mansion's website:

Last night, I went there for a performance by the Seth Kibel quartet joined by vocalist Flo Anito. Portraits of members of the Calvert family watched over the performers.

The pond, last night and today