Happy Turkey Day!!!

These handsome birds were strutting their stuff in the foothills of the Sapphire Mountains east of Hamilton last spring. I happened upon them while searching for blue(Dusky) grouse in an area where I once worked on a graduate student study. Turkeys were not present in that area back in the late 1960's when I spent lots of time there.
Happy Thanksgiving to all!!

Blue and White!

My calendar says that we are still about a month away from the official beginning of winter here in Helena. But the weather outside says that the calendar may be off by a bit. For the past several days, the thermometer has had much difficulty registering above zero degrees. And yes, we have some of the white stuff. After the fantastic weather we have had for the past two months, mother nature must be doing her compensation thing!

There is a positive side to this picture. For the past several days, we have had a blue jay coming to our feeders. There always seems to be a few of this species around the Helena Valley and during the fall months of many years, a few visit my feeders for a short time and then head off to somewhere else for the winter. With the single blue jay that is here now during this spate of harsh winter weather, perhaps we will have some of its blue gracing our trees and feeders for the remainder of the winter. That would be a welcome sight!Blue jays are quite common in the eastern US and their aggressive, raucous behavior does not engender them to many of the folks back there. For me, their rough equivalent species here in Montana is the magpie. I don't especially like them because of their aggressiveness -sorry about that Mary H. But in my backyard feeders, blue jay are appreciated and a welcome winter guest!!