Spotted Towhees (Pipilo maculatus) are beautiful colorful birds that I've seen a fair number of times, but I've found them difficult to photograph. Most of the time it is because they are foraging in thick underbrush, and they never seem to sit still. A case in point: I got a nice shot of the Towhee above at Silver Lake near Mt. St. Helens in Washington at Christmastime. But it never turned around to show its colorful breast.
Then, I was at Don Pedro Reservoir on the Tuolumne River to take a look at water levels prior to the big storms of last week (which also explains why no birds for two weeks; I was distracted by events being posted at Geotripper). There was a Towhee in the parking lot foraging for seeds or bugs. I got a shot of the bird's front, and a video as well. But no side shots!
Finally, I was out on the Tuolumne Parkway Trail today for the first time since the storms began, and I saw another Towhee foraging in the open. I got the side shot I wanted, so I was finally able to cobble together this post, from three different locations and with three different birds.
It's a bit of an odd title, but I'll explain. This sweet little family of Canada Geese (Branta canadensis) was feeding in the grass along a canal that feeds water from Don Pedro Reservoir into Turlock Lake Reservoir. They jumped into the fast flowing water as I walked over the bridge. So the water the geese were cavorting in was Tuolumne River water, but it wasn't the Tuolumne River. It was probably first diverted at Hetch Hetchy Reservoir in Yosemite National Park and sent through penstocks to produce electricity before stored once again in Don Pedro Reservoir. The water was then sent through the canal into Turlock Lake Reservoir before being divvied out to the irrigated fields of the Great Valley. Such is the complicated way we utilize our precious rivers.
Um...aren't Canada Geese supposed to be breeding far to the north in Canada? It seems there are more and more who like Central California during the summer and hang around rather than make the hazardous migration north. At times they become somewhat of a pest in parks and lawns. But those goslings sure are cute!
