Flying ducks, flying mountain

Another calm winter day on Boundary Bay.

Blue water, blue sky, Crescent Beach across the bay, and Mount Baker, soaring above the foothills.

Jagged peaks, and a hint of pink.

I love to see flocks of birds, even when they're going away.

I think they're ducks. Except for the hitchhiking gull.

"Can I join you?"

(The gull is much closer to us; those aren't mini-ducks.)

Over the border marker now, heading south.

Not exactly a V formation.

And 'way far off, in the distance.

Another Skywatch post.

Lazy day photos

I've been down with the annual winter sniffles, but managed to make a quick trip to Tsawwassen to collect eelgrass and Turkish towel for my tank critters. I took the slow road home across the lower delta, staying off busy highways where unexpected sneezes can be dangerous.

So I got to count birds; 5 hawks, on trees and light poles; half a dozen eagles, and as many nests; hundreds and hundreds of ducks and Canada geese in soggy, muddy fields; small flocks of starlings and pigeons roosting on trees and wires; and a constant stream of gulls overhead, heading southwest to wherever they go at dusk. I miss that, now that the new highway system is open and I have to keep my eyes on the road.

I pulled off, twice, to take quick photos with the little point-and-shoot.

Gazebo and branches. A bare hint of sunset, which quickly faded to grey.

Mount Baker and blueberry field. The plants turn red for the winter.

I've got the tank cleaned and refurbished. My critters are happy with their new climbing equipment/nibbles. And I'm tuckered out. Goodnight!

It's all a matter of time. And water.

Mountains; all massive, jagged rocks:

Tall, sharp peaks, to our south, in Washington State.

Mount Baker

Which will eventually crumble to this:

Beach rocks, with barnacles and brown rockweed. Boundary Bay.

And then be ground down and smoothed out, by water and critters, to this:

Sand, still being ground down, this time by worms and snails. And water. (Other tracks; human, dog, sandpiper.)

Just give it time.

Sublime to ridiculous

More White Rock beach photos from last week, in no particular order:

Mount Baker, behind the Semiahmoo hill

Disappearing seaweedy rocks, with gull.

Setting out nets for smelt.

Vicious sea monster?

Rock "garden"

Hawkweed by the railroad tracks.

More hawkweed.  With aphids.

Good excuses

Why it takes us an hour to walk one kilometre, on flat sand. It's easy going, with nothing to slow us down.

Boundary Bay, with Mount Baker, at low, low tide.

But we keep stopping to take another photo.

Clam in a tidepool, with refracted light, through a few inches of water.

Empty clamshell

Crab molt

Foot long polychaete worm, from my tank, returning to home base.

In every tidepool, hundreds of tiny, darting fish fled at our approach. These ones were "escaping" from Laurie, while I stood off to the side, without moving, except for my shutter finger.

Feather, pink and brown clam shell, worm poop, bird footprint, and a few sandy snails. As found.

Detail of feather. Worth clicking to see the tips full size.

Wave-carved sand patterns

Lugworm egg case. Most are large oval bags; this one is almost round. With worm hill and poop.

Tiny Baltic macoma shell. Most of the ones on this beach are pink. Very fragile; half the ones I bring home don't make it.

Speckled stone, with dwarf eelgrass, Zostera japonica. The stem just to the left of the stone has a row of seeds in a half sheath.

Love on a Rocky Shore

The White Rock beach, like Boundary Bay, just around the point, is mostly flat sand, reaching far out into the bay. It's ideal for children and dogs scampering across the sand, splashing knee-deep far out into the water; I have even seen a few horses running there at low tide. But at the west end, there are rocks. This is the direction that we take, on most of our visits; there's something fascinating about just plain rocks. And myriad sea creatures find safe harbour under, beside, on top of them.

The tail end of the sand, with rock intrusions.

Looking east. Small rocks, and some very big rocks in the distance, snow-capped.

Scattered rocks on sand, Laurie poking at seaweed on the incoming tide.

Sea lettuce  and rockweed "wigs" on the rocks. The rockweed turns black as it dries.

More black rockweed.

Rockweed further from shore doesn't get baked as long; at least the winged bladders stay green.

On a dry rock, black lichen and sun-baked clam shells, the remains of gull dinners.

Blue mussels sheltered in a crevice

The tide brings welcome relief to drying seaweeds and the animals hiding beneath them.

Not a rock. A two-toned stone, with barnacles.

That's love! The rock is covered at the top of mid-tide, and the letters are carved into the stone after the seaweed and barnacles were scraped off.

Life's a beach

Random photos from a happy afternoon on the beach:

Centennial Beach duck pond, beach watchers, and a kite.

A mile of sand, a bit of water, Crescent Beach, and Mount Baker

Teenagers digging a hole. Or making a mountain of sand.

Seaweed and eelgrass in ankle-deep water.

Out where the water was knee-deep, I saw this large, pink starfish.

Most of our starfish are purple or orange; I thought, at first, that this one must have been dead and fading. But no; he was very much alive, eating a clam, which he dropped when I dangled him out of the water. He squirmed and waved his tube feet around, trying to get away. I put him back as soon as Laurie took his photo.

Long, creamy yellow tube feet.

Back at the duck pond, the yellow irises are blooming.

The mystery plant of two weeks ago turned out to be an alium. Kate and Upupaepops were right.

Red sorrel, beach pea, plantain, etc., on a driftwood log.