Other than the quickly approaching end of the month and being down several posts to meet my quota, things are starting to look up. Dealing with Mom’s estate has taken a serious chunk of time, but that should wrapped up at this week’s closing – thankfully my oldest brother is taking the brunt of the financial aspects – Ron and I focused on the busy grunt work cleaning out the house etc. – which is pretty much the way it is around our house as well ha. The conditioning for the upcoming weekend race (Bix 7 link here) is nearly behind me as well. One more short taper and then just try to be as healthy as possible entering the chutes. Heat is usually a problem, however, I did punish myself on some very hot long run days – fingers crossed the internal thermostat doesn’t go bonkers. My training runs are well beyond the 7 mile distance so that isn’t a problem. That just leaves the ankle as the unknown wildcard. Feels strong, even made it through two trail runs without tweaking it again (yeah) …but still swollen. I don’t know, maybe that is just the new norm. I’ll try body shaming and hurling insults at that weak-punk-ass ankle for the next couple of days and see if it will finally give up the pity act!
Since we are talking about conditioning, thought this feathered friend would fit theme.
Hit the jump to read a bit more about this chance encounter.
Actually, it isn’t a subject fit as much as a technical execution theme. You were being secretly “conditioned” to accept sub-par pictures with the last post. Those Say’s Phoebe shots were just slightly better than my dog’s paint by number crafts and he can’t even stay in the lines yet. I need to teach him to put his paw on the line and simply bring the brush up to it -it’s the simple tricks that gets your art on the refrigerator door or on the wall for parent teacher conferences! I digress – back to these soft shots of a new bird for me.
That there is a Golden-Winged Warbler. Hallelujah, no name based on an indistinguishable feature this time, nope, the bird actually sports two golden colored bars on its wings. The ID is fairly straightforward, the issue for me was actually finding one. They Winter in the lower half of Central American and northern part of South American before migrating pretty much straight north eventually settling into the upper Midwest. If you look at Cornell’s regional maps it looks like they go out of their way to spend time in our woods – survey says that’s a LIE!
I’ve have NEVER seen this bird anywhere near me and even missed its arrival (and apparent departure) during our trip down to Dauphin Island last year. Thanks to a trip up to Montrose Point Bird Sanctuary on the Chicago lakeshore, I can finally check this bird off the hunt list.
I do need to give credit to the three ladies standing next to me in the sanctuary or you would be reading about the Bunny Rabbit I was busy taking a picture of before I overhearing one say (in a shockingly nonchalant manner) “Yep, there’s the Golden-Wing”. Whaaa Whaaa Whaaaat!?!?! Sorry Bunny, its checkmark time. Politely asked if I heard right and greatly appreciative when they pointed to it sitting in a dense tangle of brush and low shrubs. Their preferred habitat – not very conducive to those of us carrying big glass in the field. Spike the ISO and pray it hops into an opening. Yeah, that didn’t happen. She did decide to give me a quick look as it briefly popped up on a low tree branch before darting of – not to be seen again that day.
Was lucky enough to at least crank the shutter up to keep from causing a Chicago white-out blizzard. The fact you can tell it is a bird, much less see the golden bars is a miracle in itself. Eeesh, out of shots. Time to get to some takeaways. This is a female specimen. The males are quite stunning with a black mask and throat patch on a silvery backdrop with a bright yellow crown. They are known for their wicked looking sharp black bills they use to reach deep into rolled up leaves for creepies and crawlies. Our Minnesota readers may be interested in knowing they have the highest density of these declining Warblers – Cornell indicates they have the steepest population loss of any Warbler in the past 45 years. Pretty weak beyond they like to get some strange when the Blue-Winged Warblers come around. No judgement here, the little perverts.
Well, that’s a wrap. Apologies for the poor shots – these and the ones coming next ugh. It would be nice if I could bring you a male – just need to find those three ladies to point one out to me ha! Take care all,
Wildlife Intrigued 
Hahaha…you have more than one Minnesota reader? I was wondering if you had seen this one while in MN but just as I was thinking it read you had seen it in your home state!
I think you should start having your boys do the paint by numbers and selling them online or at your dog competitions. That way they always have bragging rights.
Always fun to have my morning coffee and read your adventures.
Now off to work at our new weed patch. ( Our Wordless Wednesday blog).
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I actually have at least one other that is technically from the broke state of IL, but he has another home/cabin on a lake in northern Minnesota – we worked together in the Enterprise Architecture group – both retired now yeah! Lucked out and caught one here, which is actually good because I struck out on it when we were up there a few weeks ago. I refuse to endorse the boys expanding their painting hobby – every time they do it, they get paint EVERYWHERE – on the walls, on the floor on them, on Linda – it’s an absolute nightmare trying to get it all cleaned up … and of course they don’t help one bit and just strut around going “I’m an ARTEEEEEESSSSSTTT, not a maid”. Good luck on the project – something tells me you will not let the weeds take over…now the feral Cats.. that might be a different story. Take it easy and glad you enjoy the posts with your morning brew.
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Don’t curse me with more feral cats!!! I already saw a black one at the gardens! I did one of my famous Witch hisses at it and it ran away. Luckily the witch hiss is not against the law here (yet😂).
I can understand the elevated ego of artists, always sucks being the clean up crew without help!
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Cute LYB or LGB (yellow or gold, often confused with green). Needed some green foliage to make the little one pop on the photos. Can sneak in behind it with a darker background next time? 🙂
You probably need to let your weak-punk-ass ankle heal a bit before more punishment events later in the year. Not to mention the imminent Halloween Trail setup and teardown.
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That’s a tough one, LGB is probably a bit overloaded as of late especially with Let’s Go Brandon! – but you are right, Y takes you down the yellow path and there are plenty of that fits that category, especially in the Warbler arena. Yeah, I agree with the background, like Midas, just too much golden tones. The ankle made it through the Bix today with flying colors (just a slight bit of ache that is lingering now that it is cooled down – I think it will be fine now, but the real training starts now – heavy trails, two-a-days and back into the gym to make sure the body is ready for the punishment that comes with the 100K. Will keep an eye on it in case it starts wimping out again – still a punk though hehehehe. Appreciate you dropping in Brad – tell Jan good luck on her big cross state race.
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Cute round little one, isn’t she? The All About Birds map says she passes through the greater Houston-Galveston area on her migration, so I’ll have to add her to my search list. Treat that ankle kindly, you need it to last for a lot more years!
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Definitely try to catch one of these when they pass through in the fall – try to get the male though as they are actually more colorful (as with most Warblers). My ankles and I have had a long history of antagonism. We struck a bargain that I would stop going to the dojo if it promised to stop getting injured. Although better, it has not held up its end of the bargain. We will be going back into the gym this week to start building it back up – lots of time on the wobble board and I know it hates that so hopefully it will think twice about pulling this stunt in the future. Take care Sam, appreciate you dropping in.
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Oh…be nice to the ankle.
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You can’t let this behavior slide – if it goes unpunished, it will get bolder, start recruiting the other joints and next thing you know they are making you right bad checks and crank calling the neighbors and NOBODY wants that to happen. Sometimes you have to go with the tough love for their benefit.
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LOL! NOOOOO! Not the bad checks & neighbor harassment!
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hehehe, trust me, it’s the worst!
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I was wondering if you were talking about the Bix in the quad cities, I clicked on your skip link. I lived in that town for many years and never went down there to watch them. Seams like the same guys always win, Kenya I believe? I can’t believe you are running when your ankle still has swelling in it. You are a machine, good luck at the race 🙂
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Yep, talking about the famous Bix 7 race that takes over the quad cities once a year. I thought there was some kind of community requirement you had to come out just based on the sheer amount of people lining the entire course and cheering us on – I really appreciate them helping us getting up those wicked hills. The Kenyans and Ethiopians definitely dominate the podiums there and I am always in awe as they come past us on Kirkwood – they coming up on their 5th mile, me going down in my mile 2.5. Have to admire their talent, but you do get to see them struggle as the Midwest humidity does punish them. Fortunately, (or unfortunately depending on how you look at it), most of my hobbies require a good level of physical exertion which comes with a base level of expected tweaks and bumps – I like to think of it as valuable training when something goes wrong on one of my ultra races – be aware of it, assess the current damage, predict the amount of further damage and if acceptable….forget it and move on. Thanks for the well wishes. Finished the Bix race earlier today and the ankle held better than expected – all is good … for now ha.
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Congratulations, 😊
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Thank you Sandra. 18 down, only two more before their medal year!! (they give out nice finisher medals on their 5’s anniversaries.
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