{"id":9083,"date":"2021-03-31T21:08:54","date_gmt":"2021-04-01T04:08:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/?p=9083"},"modified":"2021-03-31T21:08:57","modified_gmt":"2021-04-01T04:08:57","slug":"visit-to-monte-vista","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/2021\/03\/31\/visit-to-monte-vista\/","title":{"rendered":"Visit To Monte Vista"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A couple of weeks ago, we spent a few days in Monte Vista to do some birding in the National Wildlife Refuge. It was great to go out to this great location. This was the last location where I stayed a few nights just before the Covid lockdown started!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"2555-0162-View-Towards-Blanco-Peak-Monte-Vista-NWR\"
View Towards Blanco Peak, Monte Vista NWR.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Soon after arrival, we spent a few hours near one of the ponds in the wildlife refuge. This muskrat was spotted swimming up one of the channels adjacent to the main pond.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"2555-0020-Muskrat-Swimming-Monte-Vista-NWR\"
Muskrat Swimming, Monte Vista NWR.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

We counted about a dozen Cinnamon Teals, mostly male, farther down the channel. I managed to capture this male bird as he was spreading wings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"2555-0038-Cinnamon-Teal-Spreading-Wings\"
Cinnamon Teal Spreading Wings.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

There were two mating pairs swimming along the same channel. In this image, the female was swimming ahead of the male.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"2555-0174-Cinnamon-Teal-Female-Monte-Vista-NWR\"
Cinnamon Teal Female, Monte Vista NWR.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Soon the male came into view…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"2555-0179-Cinnamon-Teal-Male-Monte-Vista-NWR\"
Cinnamon Teal Male, Monte Vista NWR.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

This was a great location to capture these teal ducks. We were really lucky to get really close, capturing some great images as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"2555-0203-Cinnamon-Teal-Pair\"
Cinnamon Teal Pair.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The following morning we headed back to the ponds just before sunrise. The Sandhill Cranes were bathed in the dawn sunlight. This pond was a location where the cranes often spent the night to avoid predators.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"2556-0001-Sandhill-Cranes-Waiting-At-Sunrise\"
Sandhill Cranes Waiting At Sunrise.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

In the distance, water had frozen during the night. But in the foreground, the cranes were contemplating flying out for the day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"2556-0026-Sandhill-Cranes-At-Sunrise\"
Sandhill Cranes At Sunrise.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Occasional birds and groups of birds slowly took off to reach the daytime feeding grounds. I managed to make several images of this crane as it left for the day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"2556-0034-Sandhill-Crane-Take-Off-No-2\"
Sandhill Crane Take Off, No 2.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

In this image, one of the cranes was spreading its wings. Again I made several images until the crane had retracted its wings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"2556-0065-Sandhill-Cranes-And-Spreading-Wings\"
Sandhill Cranes And Spreading Wings.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

This was the first time that we had spent a night in a hotel for over a year. Also, we got to have dinner in a restaurant, practicing safe distancing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A couple of weeks ago, we spent a few days in Monte Vista to do some birding in the National Wildlife Refuge. It was great to go out to this great location. This was the last location where I stayed a few nights just before the Covid lockdown started! Soon after arrival, we spent a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[1372,307,1360,1757,1457,92,1756,425,34,306,415],"class_list":{"0":"post-9083","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-general","7":"tag-cinnamon-teal","8":"tag-ducks","9":"tag-monte-vista","10":"tag-muskrat","11":"tag-nwr","12":"tag-pond","13":"tag-refuge","14":"tag-sandhill-cranes","15":"tag-sunrise","16":"tag-water","17":"tag-wildlife"},"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMatQ-2mv","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9083","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9083"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9083\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9098,"href":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9083\/revisions\/9098"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9083"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9083"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/matchgrun.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9083"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}