I woke early this morning and was surprised to see the sun shining as I was expecting it to be rainy and overcast. I wanted to get up and get an early start, but my foot and ankle hurt so much from the little bit of walking I did after work yesterday and so I wound up sleeping in.

Eventually, I got up and headed out. I first checked on the swan family I was watching and noticed that they only had one cygnet left out of the four they had. That was a little sad and I couldn't help but wonder what happened to the other three. I wanted to get some photos of the swans, but they were in a bad spot so I decided to leave. While heading back to my car I was startled by a big water snake who was also startled by me and took off back into the water. I couldn't believe how quickly it could move. After a slight freak out, I left and did a drive through James Baird State Park and Cary Institute of Environmental Studies. I didn't see much of anything at either of those locations, so I went back to check on the swans before going home.

The swans had moved and were in a decent spot. I took a seat and watched them. They swam around and ate and came so close to me. The youngster stayed very close to his parents. I kept hoping he would hop on one of their backs, but that didn't happen. Perhaps he is now too old to be doing that. I stayed with them for roughly 90 minutes before going home to chill for a bit.

After my little break at home, I headed out to the pond where I discovered all the Canada Geese and Goslings last night. When I first arrived, I spotted a snapping turtle in the road. I took pictures of it before it headed off into the grass where I then proceeded to get more pics. It wound up going under my car and hanging out in the shade there for roughly 2 1/2 hours. When it was time for me to leave, I had to ask someone to keep an eye on it so I could pull forward without running it over.

The Canada Geese and Goslings were all there hanging out. The goslings were a hoot to watch as they are so awkward and funny. In addition to them, I had a cormorant fly in and hang out for a bit. The cormorant gave me some wonderful opportunities for photos and I enjoyed the time it spent at the pond. Eventually he left and some killdeer came in nice and close for pics. In general, everything was so close that I had to keep moving back.

It was tough to decide on a photo to use for the blog today, so I went with a cormorant shot since I haven't posted one of those guys in a long time! Enjoy my blog post and stay tuned as I plan to add a handful of shots from today on my Facebook page!