Nature Notes: Photo walking at the end of August

I haven't been walking as much as I like to this summer because the heat has hit me hard this year. After a morning rain I realized it was fairly pleasant and might be a good chance for a late August walk at Shelley Lake.

I do enjoy the green and shade which comes with summer and helps somewhat with the heat. A swallowtail butterfly joined me on the path down to the water where I wanted to check out how the ducks and geese were doing.

For some reason most times of the year there is usually only one white duck or maybe two that hang out with the other ducks and geese. I noted that there were three swimming together on this August day.

There were a lot of geese and mallard ducks as usual but I noticed that they don't make as much noise this time of year as they do other times, particularly during the spring. I know the loud times are probably partly about mating and babies and such.

I've never seen so much growth on the sand bars where the geese and ducks congregate and during the winter where the gulls arrive. The great blue herons were hanging out on these bars a lot during the spring.

The grass often starts growing on the sandbars in the spring but I can't remember them having a lot of wildflowers like they do this year.

I miss the wildlife when I'm not walking at the lake as much. Usually I manage to get up early enough for some summer walking but this year I have probably done the least amount of walking ever.

I am happy to see that it will be slightly cooler this week and in between rain showers I should be able to walk more.

Even short walks on shaded paths would be better than nothing. Soon the tree will be changing over to their brilliant colors but green is also very pleasant.

By Thursday morning the new nature notes link goes up at Rambling Woods, the host of this theme.