It seemed a bit late in the morning to be heading out for my walk  the other day . . . nearly 9:30 am already. . . I never go birding that late!   By then, the sun is getting hot and high in the sky, and mid-morning is generally past the birds’ most active early time,  so there is usually less to see.  But, much to my delight, there were many beautiful sights and sounds – what a joy it turned out to be!  Another day, another bounty of nature!  One of the most special moments was watching this cheerful Red-bellied Woodpecker flitting playfully about, directly over my head.

In Judaism, there is a special blessing that one recites upon seeing beautiful scenes of nature, so fitting to say on a morning like this:

Blessed are you, G-d, King of the Universe, who has created such things in His world.

There are beautiful Hebrew blessings for an endless number of experiences:  blessings over the scent of fragrant trees or shrubs, another for herbs, grasses or flowers, another over fragrant fruits, another for seeing a rainbow.  Some would use the following blessing for other wonders of nature, maybe even upon seeing these incredible BeautyBerries below!

Blessed are you, G-d, King of the Universe, Author of Creation.

I am blessed to live in a place that allows me to walk daily among the plants and the wildlife in beautiful natural settings – all year round.  This year, I must really focus on identifying more butterflies.  I know the names of several of the common butterflies in our region, but lately I have observed many others that are new to me – always more to learn.

This is the beginning of migration season, and the first time I will be here in Florida all fall.  What an opportunity to see all the smaller birds that are arriving – lots of new little birds to learn to identify.  Meantime, it’s always fun to see our ‘regulars’, like this Little Green Heron, out on a morning fishing expedition

or these parent Common Gallinules (Moorhens) teaching their chicks how to find the yummiest plants.

The Tri-colored Herons are keeping themselves fancy, preening their fluff!   One of these days, I should gather all my recent TCH pics into one blog post just to illustrate how much variation there is in how they look over the period of 7-8 months, from breeding colors, to babies, to various stages from juveniles to mature adults.