Tuesday, May 02, 2006

ten beautiful birds

The "ten most beautiful birds" meme has already been on many of the blogs I frequent, so I figured it would be only a matter of time until someone tagged me, or I picked up on one of the open-ended "Consider yourself tagged!" invitations. Because, face it, I like birds and I haven't had any bird posts lately. I have now been officially tagged by Pamela at Thomasburg Walks ; this is going to be an unpremeditated, extemporaneous, off-the-top-of-my-head list of some of the beautiful birds I've seen:

1. Painted bunting- I already wrote about this one at Whorled Leaves.
2. Tree swallow- iridescent green, the joy of motion in flight
3. Wood duck- exquisite
4. Sandhill crane- a pair, alternately flapping and soaring over a bog washed in spring green and red, yesterday's blessing
5. Eastern bluebird- true blue
6. Red-breasted nuthatch- delicate
7. Common loon- wears the stars on its back
8. Great gray owl- I missed you this winter
9. Common (great) egret- serpentine reflection in still waters
10. Tufted titmouse- gray is anything but plain

I'm tagging Gina at Raising Frolic , Melissa at Between Plow and Wood , and whoever else wants to play!

3 comments:

R.Powers said...

Good list. I can relate to the egret reflection ...

Anonymous said...

Thanks for taking up the meme. I was just this morning thinking, "How could I have left the red-breasted nuthatch off mine?" But I never thought of the loon, which certainly should be thought of. Painted bunting--I liked your story at Whorled Leaves--great way to start a life of birding. I hope I get to see one some day.

Deb said...

FC- I was probably influenced by seeing your photo of one before I posted!

Pamela- I'm thinking of all the species I could have mentioned too! Being from Minnesota, I could not leave off the loon, which is seen on everything from lottery tickets to tax forms to license plates here.